editor in chief: peter klapes managing editors: tristan st. germain, noah valdez general editors: douglas alfidi, julia bloechl, michael brue, iulia boboc, jeffrey donofrio, jennifer howard, gary hu, gregory kacergis, alexander kerker, weitao liu, lauren peplau, jacob schick graduate advisor: myles casey faculty advisor: ronald tacelli, s.j. cover designs courtesy of gregory kacergis. featuring: rylov, arkady in the blue expanse. 1918. enso design derived from a sketch by kendrick shaw; obtained via wikimedia commons. the materials herein represent the personal opinions of the individual authors and do not necessarily represent the views of dianoia or boston college. if you have questions regarding the journal, would like to submit your work for review, or if you’d be interested in joining next year’s staff, please contact the journal at dianoia@bc.edu. dianoia the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college spring 2018 issue v boston college 140 commonwealth avenue chestnut hill, ma 02467 https://www.bc.edu/bc-web/schools/mcas/departments/philosophy/undergraduate/dianoia.html © 2018 the trustees of boston college printed by progressive print solutions. editor-in-chief: peter klapes senior managing editor: noah valdez managing editors: weitao liu, ethan yates general editors: benjamin dewhurst, christopher fahey, jennifer howard, gregory kacergis, brian kominick, ana luque, elizabeth lopreiato, jacob schick, alexander turney, lauren white, madeline wolfe, xinyu zhou external reviewers: jeremy freudberg (boston university), justin messmer (boston university), tristan st. germain (brown university), alexander stooshinoff (concordia university) communications editor: jessica flores graduate advisor: myles casey faculty advisor: ronald tacelli, s.j. cover designs courtesy of gregory kacergis. featuring: cézanne, paul the card players. 1892-1893; obtained via wikimedia commons. the materials herein represent the personal opinions of the individual authors and do not necessarily represent the views of dianoia or boston college. if you have questions regarding the journal, would like to submit your work for review, or if you’d be interested in joining next year’s staff, please contact the journal at dianoia@bc.edu. dianoia the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college spring 2019 issue vi boston college 140 commonwealth avenue chestnut hill, ma 02467 https://www.bc.edu/bc-web/schools/mcas/departments/philosophy/undergraduate/dianoia.html © 2019 the trustees of boston college printed by progressive print solutions. 4 the editorial staff of dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college would like to extend our sincerest thanks to the following individuals for their assistance in making this issue of dianoia possible: nancy adams, bc libraries mary crane, institute for the liberal arts susan dunn, center for centers gabriel feldstein, bc libraries gary gurtler, s.j., philosophy department stephen jarjoura, information technology services peter marino, center for centers cherie mcgill, philosophy department sarah melton, bc libraries dermot moran, philosophy department john o'connor, bc libraries paula perry, philosophy department sarah smith, philosophy department christopher soldt, media technology services zachary willcutt, philosophy department we would also like to thank dr. ronald tacelli, s.j., of the boston college philosophy department, for his invaluable assistance as our advisor. acknowledgements 5 the editorial staff of dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college would like to extend our sincerest thanks to the following individuals for their assistance in making this issue of dianoia possible: mary crane, institute for the liberal arts jacqueline delgado, center for centers susan dunn, center for centers gabriel feldstein, bc libraries stephen jarjoura, information technology services peter marino, center for centers cherie mcgill, philosophy department sarah melton, bc libraries dermot moran, philosophy department john o'connor, bc libraries paula perry, philosophy department sarah smith, philosophy department we would also like to thank dr. ronald tacelli, s.j., of the boston college philosophy department, for his invaluable assistance as our advisor. 4 the editorial staff of dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college would like to extend our sincerest thanks to the following individuals for their assistance in making this issue of dianoia possible: nancy adams, bc libraries mary crane, institute for the liberal arts rosemarie deleo, philosophy susan dunn, center for centers rev. gary gurtler, s.j., philosophy department peter marino, center for centers cherie mcgill, philosophy department jane morris, bc libraries dermot moran, philosophy department paula perry, philosophy department christopher soldt, media technology services eileen sweeney, philosophy department rev. ronald tacelli, s.j., philosophy department we would also like to thank rev. dr. ronald tacelli, s.j., of the b.c. philosophy department, for his invaluable assistance as our advisor. thomas lombardo, jordan pino, and the issue iv editorial board also deserve a word of thanks for their work towards inaugurating this important journal, after its brief hiatus. acknowledgements dianoia philosophy journal issue v spr 18 final pdf no crop marks.pdf 5issue v � spring 2018 spring 2018 dear reader, in your hands is issue v of dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college. this year, we were pleased to receive a record eighty submissions from north and south america, europe, and asia. after a lengthy review process, we selected for publication seven truly impressive philosophical works which present a diverse array of philosophical themes. our journal begins with two papers—one on spinoza and hinduism; another on heidegger and the kyoto school—that consider the perennial dichotomy of east and west. our next paper, the “praxis of the soviet avant-garde,” employs the thought of such philosophers as theodor adorno and max horkheimer to investigate the cultural and economic foundations of soviet-era avant-garde art. from there, our authors bring us on an engaging journey, from a consideration of the representational fallacy and the philosophy of time, to a reflection on the work of walter benjamin and jürgen habermas, to a reading of the myth of er, and, finally, an explication of martin heidegger’s what is called thinking?. you will find, on our front and back covers, arkady rylov’s in the blue expanse. its russian artist calls to mind our paper on the "praxis of the soviet avant-garde." on our journal’s back cover, we overlay rylov’s contemplative, serene masterpiece with the image of the enso, a sacred image of the zen school of buddhism and a common subject of japanese calligraphy. the synergy of these two images, on the front and back—alpha and omega—of our journal articulates the bridging of culture and ideas that serves as a great impetus for, and cornerstone of, our publication. before we close, we want to express our most sincere gratitude to our journal’s friends, supporters, and advocates. first and foremost, we would like to thank publicly our editorial board—of sixteen talented undergraduates—for their keen philosophical and editorial insights. we are also greatly indebted to our faculty advisor, fr. ronald tacelli, s.j., for his words of encouragement and expert advice, and to our graduate advisor, myles casey, who constantly made sure that we would have a product to show for our late-night hours of editing and reviewing. we thank paula perry of the philosophy department for her constant support, advocacy, and organizational assistance. and, ultimately, without the generosity of boston college’s institute for the liberal arts, directed by dr. mary crane, the center for centers, the boston college philosophy department, and the undergraduate committee of the philosophy department, our vision for an international review of undergraduate philosophical work would never become the reality that it is today. happy reading! sincerely, peter klapes, editor-in-chief tristan st. germain, managing editor noah valdez, managing editor a l e t t e r f r o m t h e e d it o r s 65 c o n t r ib u t o r s abhi ruparelia university of richmond abhi ruparelia is a rising senior at the university of richmond, where he is majoring in philosophy and leadership studies. while his philosophical interests remain diverse, he is particularly fascinated by questions in meta-ethics and moral philosophy, especially on normativity, moral responsibility, blame, and free will. on the side, he also likes to dabble in political philosophy and has recently started to become interested in mathematical logic. for his senior thesis, he is working on a version of the paper published in this journal, which he aims to explore and refine in greater detail. after graduation, he plans on applying to graduate schools in philosophy. sherry tseng university of pennsylvania sherry tseng is a senior at the university of pennsylvania studying philosophy, with an interest in the philosophy of language and how it intersects with justice, epistemology, and aesthetics. using her philosophical background, she is particularly excited to see how it may apply to practical and real-world settings. in her spare time, she’s either making playlists on spotify, exploring the city, or trying to convince her friends to go to karaoke with her. chenyu bu university of wisconsin-madison chenyu bu is a junior studying philosophy, music composition, and math at the university of wisconsin-madison with honors in the liberal arts. over the course of her studies she has developed a strong interest in the intersection of philosophy and music—especially in how modernist ideologies in philosophy such as german idealism and existentialism are reflected and expressed in musical art. she is particularly interested in the music of j. s. bach, arnold schoenberg, claude debussy, and olivier messiaen, and finds kant, hegel, nietzsche, and sartre captivating and resonant with these composers. apart from composing music and studying philosophy, she is also an active ballroom dancer and enjoys choreographing. after college, she plans to pursue a ph. d. in creative practice and critical inquiry as an artist-scholar. 66 caroline gillette boston college caroline gillette is a rising senior pursuing her bachelor of arts at boston college. she is double majoring in philosophy (in the pre-law/international studies/public policy track) and economics. her academic interests include political philosophy, particularly the philosophy of law and legal authority. she is also interested in hegel, especially dialectical phenomenology. she intends to study law after completing her undergraduate studies. felipe daniel montero university of buenos aires felipe daniel montero is currently a student of philosophy at the university of buenos aires. his primary focus is the philosophy of art, and he is especially interested in the relationship between the artistic phenomenon and other essential aspects of human existence such as politics, science and religion. with this in mind, he finds the traditions of german idealism, heidegger’s existentialism, and the writings of the argentine author jorge luis borges especially revealing. 6 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college spring 2019 dear reader, with immense pleasure and honor, i have the opportunity to present to you, once again, the culmination of rigorous scholarship, collaboration, and generosity. issue vi of dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college represents, indeed, the world’s finest undergraduate work in philosophy. we were delighted this year to have received over 150 submissions from around the world, and our published articles and book review are the fruits of dianoia’s collaboration with scholars from north america, south america, and europe. in fact, earlier this year, we were approached by cambridge scholars publishing (newcastle upon tyne, uk) to publish a review of the argentine philosopher julio cabrera’s latest work on bioethics, discomfort and moral impediment: the human situation, radical bioethics, and procreation. our graduate advisor, myles casey, has kindly offered a thought-provoking explication and review of cabrera’s work. our publication mandate has remained: “dianoia publishes the world’s finest and most thoughtful, original, and creative papers on any philosophical topic or idea.” the papers in our current issue accordingly present thoughtful and original philosophical work that engages with some of philosophy’s most revered fields of scholarship, including hermeneutics, phenomenology, philosophical anthropology, the philosophy of politics, as well as film theory, critical theory, and the philosophy of communication. in many ways, our selections this year represent our editorial staff’s training in a robust and dynamic department of philosophy, which has uniquely provided us with, among other things, world-class training in contemporary continental philosophy. i am certain that such training will continue to influence our annual review and will continue to keep us firmly in our position as a top journal of undergraduate work in philosophy. in many ways, the design of our front and back covers represents the ubiquity of the philosophical dialogue that dianoia—and the journal’s name further suggests this—proudly features. the dialogue—such as that occurring on our front and back covers—transcends physical borders and enables, as it does in cézanne’s work, its interlocutors to share a drink and a game of cards over philosophy. as you will see, our own choice of cover design, inspired by this issue’s piece on roland barthes, maurice merleau-ponty, and paul cézanne, is already a manifestation of such a dialogical act. it is with bittersweet sentiments that i conclude my letter this year, as i will be stepping down from my post as editor-in-chief to focus on my graduate studies here at boston college. before i close, however, i would like to express my sincerest gratitude to those who have supported me during my editorial tenure. first and foremost, i would like to thank all dianoia editors, past and present, whose 6issue vi ◆ spring 2019 a l e t t e r f r o m t h e e d it o r 7issue vi ◆ spring 2019 philosophical expertise and keen eye have made the journal what it is today. my colleagues (and, above all, friends), noah valdez, weitao liu, and ethan yates, in dianoia’s ‘upper-level management,’ as we call it, deserve my heartfelt thanks. i am greatly indebted to our faculty advisor, fr. ron tacelli, for his generous words of encouragement and generous supply of dinner and snacks during our late-night editorial sessions. i thank the boston college philosophy department and the institute for the liberal arts, directed by dr. mary crane, for the support, both in-kind and financial. paula perry, of the boston college philosophy department, deserves a word of sincere thanks for her advocacy, support, expertise, and graciousness. i thank, also, gregory kacergis, of boston college’s media technology services for turning our philosophical review into a work of art—his patience, and above all, his friendship, does not go unnoticed. and, at this point, as i officially complete my undergraduate studies at boston college, i would like to thank publicly my family, as well as those friends, colleagues, and supporters who have made this and many other endeavors possible. happy reading! sincerely, peter klapes editor-in-chief 98 c o n t r ib u t o r s natasha beaudin pearson mcgill university natasha beaudin pearson is a soon-to-be graduate of mcgill university, where she completed a joint honours b.a. in philosophy and art history. while her philosophical interests are wide-ranging, she has a particular fondness for the continental tradition, especially phenomenology, existentialism, feminist theory, and psychoanalytic theory. for her philosophy thesis, natasha examined freud’s seminal paper “mourning and melancholia” through the lens of existential anxiety, as it is conceived by heidegger in being and time. the aim of her essay was to problematize the reasons freud gives for positing a clear ontological distinction between “normal” mourning and “pathological” melancholia (the old term for clinical depression). in doing so, she sought to interrogate the bases on which our conceptions of mental health (and mental illness) are founded. a proud montrealer, she is currently having the time of her life travelling across argentina and chile. peter gavaris boston college peter gavaris is a senior at boston college finishing up a b.a. in english with a minor in film studies. over the course of his studies, his primary focus has been on modernist thought and expression across visual and literary arts, and accompanying critical theory from the likes of benjamin, agamben, and derrida. he has, likewise, developed an interest in cinema, with a particular infatuation with the films of abbas kiarostami. peter contributes regularly as the film critic for the heights, the independent student newspaper of boston college, and he supplements his journalistic endeavors with significant coursework on non-fiction writing and literature. this past summer, he worked with filmmaker rachel boynton on the production of a documentary on how the civil war and reconstruction are taught in american schools. he continues to remain interested in the role of aesthetic representation in both narrative and nonfiction works. brendan chambers boston college brendan chambers is currently a senior at boston college studying english and secondary education. his focus is in twentieth century american literature, and he is particularly interested in its intersection with philosophy and linguistics. he has recently completed a thesis that investigates how jack kerouac’s development and implementation of the spontaneous prose method laid the ideological foundation for the new journalism as a movement. brendan will be attending the university of north carolina chapel hill in pursuit of his phd in english in the fall, looking to continue and deepen his studies at the nexus of the language and philosophy. 99issue vi ◆ spring 2019 ryan cardoza stony brook university ryan cardoza is a junior studying philosophy at stony brook university. his philosophical areas of interest include the appearance/reality distinction (its condition of possibility and conceptual consequences), speculative metaphysics and the possibility thereof, and the problem of nihilism and its relation to knowledge. philosophers whom he finds particularly interesting and relevant to these problems include nietzsche, deleuze, kant, and plato. he is also interested in contemporary developments in realism and rationalism in continental philosophy, especially those influenced by deleuze. science is an interest as well, especially, but not limited to, the areas of chaos theory and complex systems. he is also a musician. maxwell wade rutgers university max wade is an undergraduate senior at rutgers university graduating in may 2019 with a ba in philosophy and political science. his research interests include marxism and communization theory, history of philosophy, and philosophy of religion with a specific focus on jewish and christian mysticism. his thesis was on the historical reception and interpretation of nietzsche's eternal return from heidegger to the present. after graduation he plans to pursue a phd in philosophy at boston college. gabriel vidal pontifical catholic university of chile gabriel vidal quinones is a student at the pontifical catholic university of chile. he began his academic career with an interest in living beings, i.e., biology. however, his interests have shifted from the empirical to the conceptual. yet, he stays within a realm of interconnected themes—his interests include the metaphysics of individuation, mereology, ontology, and the epistemology of bioethics (especially relating to environmental issues and technology), and phenomenology. he is at work on a dissertation on the thought of arne naess, the father of deep ecology and spinoza. specifically, he is investigating how the metaphysics and epistemology of the latter influenced the former—a work that encompasses well gabriel’s wide-ranging interests. 6 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college spring 2020 dear reader, it is with great honor and pride that i present to you issue vii of dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college! this year we received more than 140 submissions from north and south america, europe, the middle east, australia and asia—testifying to dianoia’s genuinely international appeal in attracting the finest undergraduate philosophical works from over sixty academic institutions. but before writing further about what makes this issue of dianoia unique, i would be remiss if i did not first praise the tenacity and dedication of our editorial board in making the fruit of this year’s labor possible amid the ongoing covid-19 pandemic. publishing a journal as committed to philosophical excellence, original scholarship and intercontinental collaboration poses no easy task, virus aside, so it is nothing short of a miracle that our team managed to carry on with issue vii while simultaneously adjusting to the disruptiveness of a global pandemic; if anything, it demonstrates the astounding resiliency of dianoia’s editors, and the following issue speaks for itself. this year, our journal received the privilege to publish five wonderfully insightful and thoughtful essays on a wide range of original topics and ideas, some of which include: aristotelian virtue ethics, epistemic injustice and artificial intelligence, sartrean existentialism, arendt and environmental ethics, and heidegger on technology and the work of art. in the interest of philosophically engaging with covid-19—a feat still quite rare in the early days of the virus—dianoia is pleased to present an interview with the joseph chair in catholic philosophy and current chair of the department of philosophy at boston college, dermot moran, speaking on the pandemic and its assorted effects on everyday life. as a final note, you will find on the front cover nicolae grigorescu’s andreescu à barbizon (1879) and on the back cover isaac whitehead’s in milford sound, west coast, new zealand (1878). when combined, grigorescu and whitehead’s masterpieces illustrate a picture of the magnificence of crude nature and the necessity of reconsidering the ethics of consumption—a theme called to mind by one of this year’s essays entitled: “human (and) nature: using arendt to reconcile models of environmental ethics.” in light of all of these new developments, dianoia’s resolve in fostering intellectual debate and dialogue remains preserved once more; that being said, none of these accomplishments would have been possible without the extensive base that comprise the journal’s friends, patrons and advisors. first and foremost, i would like to thank my executive editorial board—who i am lucky to consider as much as friends as fellow collaborators—ethan yates, weitao liu, lauren white and nicholas arozarena, and our phenomenally-resourceful and dedicated graduate advisor, peter klapes, who helped make my transition from managing-editor to editor-in-chief smooth and a l e t t e r f r o m t h e e d it o r 7issue vii ◆ spring 2020 worry-free. i extend a heartfelt thanks to our faculty advisor, fr. ronald tacelli, s.j., for his steadfast support and continual encouragement from the journal’s inception in 2011 to its current form. we also are greatly indebted to the boston college philosophy department—particularly the efforts of its chair, dermot moran, both for his sagacious advice and his resounding alacrity in agreeing to an interview with our journal—as well as the institute for the liberal arts and its director mary crane, for their financial and legal support. department administrators paula perry and sarah smith deserve a great word of thanks for their help in scheduling meeting spaces for the journal, and also for their essential expertise and unwavering advocacy on the journal’s behalf. lastly, i would like to thank the wonderful efforts of our multitalented graphic designer gregory kacergis, without whom the present work would be impossible; or at least, not nearly the aesthetical masterpiece that it is today (we wish him all the best professionally and cannot express how much his presence will be missed). we also thank here the countless others whose work have made dianoia what it is over the years, and you the reader, for your invaluable support and patronage of our journal. we wish you, your families and friends, health and safety as we continue the fight against covid-19, and look forward to seeing you again in issue viii. all the best and happy reading! sincerely, noah valdez, editor-in-chief 88 c o n t r ib u to r s noah forslund st. olaf college noah forslund is a junior philosophy major at st. olaf college in northfield, minnesota. he has a particular infatuation with baruch spinoza, and spent the fall studying kierkegaard at the university of copenhagen. other specific areas of philosophical interest include philosophy of art, philosophy of religion, and existentialism. he is also interested in intersections between philosophical and psychological examinations of self, and hopes to pursue a career in psychotherapy. in his spare time, he writes music and poetry, and plays in several college bands. matthew a. stanley wheaton college, il matthew stanley is a graduating senior in the philosophy department at wheaton college (il). his primary project consists in elucidating the structures of finite experience. he relies particularly on gadamer’s hermeneutical ontology to provide an account of how we uncover meaning through an ongoing hermeneutical dialogue with being in language. matthew’s research leads him to examine the interactions between philosophical systems in order to discern the value and possibility of different starting points in life and reflection. recently, matthew’s inquiry has led him to the intersection of the kyoto school (japanese zen buddhists) with martin heidegger. nonetheless, his interests remain eclectic as he seeks to draw on thinkers such as st. irenaus, slavoj zizek, alasdair macintyre, and karl barth. leah hasdan depaul university leah hasdan is a senior at depaul university finishing up her studies in philosophy and art history. while she is primarily focused on doing research in aesthetics, as a first generation student she is influenced by her family's experiences living under the soviet union. much of her intellectual curiosity stem's from uncovering the integrity behind the politicization of russian literature and art. leah is currently working with the depaul art museum to start their online journal, whereas her passion project currently involves constructing a silk-screen printer so as to promote the application of autonomous art. in her free time, leah enjoys taking ballet classes, cooking with friends, and evening runs on the lakefront. jazlyn cartaya new york university jazlyn cartaya is a recent graduate of new york university, tisch school of the arts, with a bfa in film and tv and philosophy. last year she was accepted to compass: an undergraduate philosophy workshop at princeton university, where 89issue v f spring 2018 she presented a paper on the philosophy of language (elisabeth camp, “metaphor and that certain ‘je ne sais quoi’”) and attended a series of lectures. for the past two years, she has volunteered as a judge and moderator with the nyc high school ethics bowl at columbia university and nyu; an event which promotes ethical awareness and encourages philosophical thinking and discourse in high school students. during her academic career at nyu, she has taken classes in metaphysics, epistemology, logic, philosophy of language, ethics, ancient philosophy, modern philosophy, and existentialism. jazlyn currently works as a visual effects artist at jazlyncartaya.com and plans to pursue a phd in philosophy. max fineman columbia university max fineman is a senior studying philosophy and political theory at columbia university. max has focused on phenomenology, german idealism, and 20th century marxism, though he has recently also become interested in the history of metaphysics, especially in aristotle and kant. he is also interested in the influence of jewish and islamic thought on the history of western philosophy. max completed a senior thesis on the concept of presence and its relation to the heideggerian question of being. he wonders often about the relation between practical and theoretical philosophy and about methodologies for reading philosophical texts. chris fahey boston college christopher fahey is a sophomore at boston college. he is majoring in philosophy and math with a minor in music. his main areas of philosophical interest include ancient and medieval philosophy (especially plato, augustine, and aquinas). he is also a member of the mcas honors program. in his free time, chris enjoys playing piano and is a member of the boston college chamber music society. he would like to thank his philosophy professors, including fr. gary gurtler, s.j., for their advice and encouragement. jon stuart victor yale university jon stuart victor is a senior philosophy major at yale university. his primary academic interest is continental philosophy, specifically critical theory and existentialism. he wrote his senior thesis on the aesthetics of theodor w. adorno. in addition to philosophy, jon has done significant coursework in literature and creative writing. he was managing editor of the yale daily news during his junior year, and has won several awards and fellowships for his work in journalism. he is originally from montreal, canada. 91issue vi ◆ spring 2019 δι αν οι α review of discomfort and moral impediment ( julio cabrera)1 myles casey, ph.d. student the pennsylvania state university julio cabrera opens discomfort and moral impediment by announcing his intention to cohere into a single philosophical system two regions of investigation that are often sequestered from one another in ethical treatises: a structural analysis of the human situation within the world, and the investigation into “the very possibility of morality and of a morality of procreation in particular,” these investigations informing, respectively, cabrera’s bifurcation of the book (viii). the first part presents a structural and ontological framework, out of which cabrera can derive, and ground, the practical and moral conclusions that he defends in the second. cabrera believes that this move places his articulation of antinatalism on surer footing than those of other antinatalist authors—in particular, david benatar—and as being more capable of responding to objections from both pro-natalist and “affirmative-ethical” theorists. cabrera’s overarching project throughout the book is to dislodge procreation from what he claims to be “its usual position as a mere ‘natural act,’ or as an obviously ethical act, or even as the most ethical of all acts” (ibid). methodologically, cabrera freely utilizes various aspects of the “continental” and “analytical” traditions of western philosophy. from just a cursory glance at the book: in the first part’s structural analysis of the human situation, cabrera draws on heidegger, schopenhauer, sartre, and nietzsche, placing them into dialogue with the hispanophone 1 julio cabrera, discomfort and moral impediment: the human situation, radical bioethics, and procreation, (newcastle upon tyne: cambridge scholars publishing, 2019), 280pp., £61.99(hbk), ibsn 9781527518035. 92 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college philosophers, josé ortega y gasset, enrique dussel, and fernando savater. throughout his work, cabrera manages to tactfully appropriate these existential arguments within an unmistakably “analytic” organizational structure, making use of “informal logic” (as cabrera, himself, remarks) in deducing his ontological and normative conclusions. these conclusions are, in turn, in contradiction to those of benatar, kant, singer, dworkin, tooley, and nagel (to name just a few). thematically, part i begins with a brief outline of what cabrera contends to be the most basic principle of traditional ethics, the “minimal ethical articulation (mea).” the mea is operative as the most basic, yet ultimately non-binding, aspect of the traditional ethics and acts as a “minimal demand” to consider, in the planning of our own life projects, the interests, feelings, and life projects of others, only insofar as theses others, too, consider the interests, feelings, and projects of others (2-3). this demand of the mea, cabrera argues, has priority over respecting the autonomy of others, helping, and refraining from harming others because we may encounter another whose interests, feelings, and projects are such that we should not respect their autonomy and should actively impeded the fulfillment of their projects (4-5). cabrera then turns to more ontological considerations of human being, in chapters 2 and 3, to articulate his concept of “negative ethics,” the question of discomfort, and the status of “value” in human life. the concept of “negative ethics,” in contradistinction to what he calls the “affirmative ethics” of traditional moral philosophy, is integral to cabrera’s book, and this distinction is concomitantly developed alongside his structural arguments regarding the human situation in the first part, and presented as an alternative ethical framework in his arguments against procreation in the second. cabrera’s articulation of “negative ethics” in chapter 2 serves as a prolegomenon to his antinatalist theses throughout part ii, and contends that it cannot be taken as self-evidently true that there is inherent value to human life—its truthfulness can only be established through a “slow and careful process of argumentation” (10). if it is not self-evidentially true, and has not been defended through rigorous argumentation, cabrera argues that he is licensed to advance the opposite thesis: “[…] human life carries something like an initial structural disadvantage […]that human life initially presents a valueless character or a ‘lack of value,’ not in the agnostic sense of not being ‘good or bad’ but in the sense of carrying from the outset an adverse value” (10-11). the remainder of the second chapter presents a series of easily refutable, foil arguments in support of the adverse value of human.2 the inconclusiveness of these approaches necessitates cabrera’s ontological framing arguments in chapters 3-5. at the beginning of the third chapter, cabrera presents 2 in brief, the five non-structural arguments are the following: [1] that people suffer on a daily basis, both in mundane (e.g., a heartburn) and severe (e.g., torture) ways; [2] that many in the history of philosophy have portrayed the human life and the world as something degenerate that, through moral struggle, we can restore or overcome; [3] that humans, through metaphysics and religion, have often imagined an idyllic world to make suffering their current one bearable; [4] that a human life is not irreplaceable and that we can, in time, ‘forget’ about a deceased loved one; [5] that humans, generally, need the value and recognition of others in order to have a sense of self-worth, rather than produce it endogenously, demonstrates only an extrinsic value to life, and not an intrinsic one (11-21). 93issue vi ◆ spring 2019 review of discomfort and moral impediment (julio cabrera) human being as having a non-exhaustive trifold structure—[a] human life, from birth has a “decaying” structure that can end at any point; [b] human life’s decaying-being is characterized by three kinds of “frictions’—physical pain, discouragement (i.e., the possibility of “lacking the will” to continue to be), and “exposure to the aggressions of other humans”; [c] the ability to react against the two aforementioned structural aspects by “positive value creation” (23). cabrera calls this trifold structure of human being the “terminality of being” (24). in support of his concept of the “terminality of being,” cabrera formulates what he terms the “ser/estar distinction”: both are spanish infinitives for the verb, ‘to be,’ the former, however, denoting a more ‘essential,’ structural, permanent sense of ‘to be,’ pertaining to “the being of life,” whereas the former denotes the more particularized, impermanent, and circumstantially contingent ways of being within the ‘overarching’ structure of life (27-28). at this point, one would not be remiss to immediately call to mind heidegger’s ontological difference, which cabrera does reference, but subsequently attempts to differentiate from his ser/estar by citing the incongruity between the spanish and german words for being (ibid). cabrera’s insistence that the ser/estar distinction is not heidegger’s ontological difference is, however, specious. in his discussion of the role of death, cabrera formulates the dual concepts of “deathestar” and “death-ser” that serve functions to heidegger’s ontical and ontological death (30).3 further, in chapter 4, cabrera conceptualizes the “intra-structural” (i.e., estar) “reactive” creation of positive values (35), which he later describes as a type of “flight” from the terminality of being (140), mirrors heidegger’s analysis of the existential mode of dasein’s being-in-the-world as “falling prey” or as “entanglement” [verfallen] in §38 of being and time.4 the ser/estar distinction is, for cabrera, a necessary condition for the structural discomfort argument, and for much of the remainder of the book. it allows him to maintain that, on the structural level of the being of human life (ser), there can be an “adverse value” to life, i.e., no positive value whatsoever, and yet, on the individuated level of estar, a human being can actively create positive values—a phenomenon that cabrera describes as “living a double life” (30). every activity and thing that does, or can, appear as valuable to a human being is only on account of this reactive activity of positive value creation on the estar-level of life. turning to consider ethics within this structural framework, cabrera defines, in chapter 5, “moral impediment” as “the structural impossibility of acting in the world without harming or manipulating someone at some given moment (not, of course, everyone at every moment)” (52). he offers three classification types of moral impediment, but, most importantly, all forms of moral impediment are structured according to a 3 cabrera describes death-estar as “the kind of death that happens to us on a certain date from which we ‘cease to exist’,” and death-ser as “more directly tied to birth,” and as “a kind of ‘structural death,’ the gradual death that encompasses our ‘lives,’ the structural decaying due to frictions (pain, discouragement, moral impediment), and finally de [death-estar]” (30). compare this with the heidegger’s analysis of ontological death in relation to dasein’s care, angst, being-toward-death, and finite transcendence and the parallelism becomes apparent. 4 martin heidegger, being and time, trans. joan stambaugh, ed. dennis schmidt (albany: suny press, 2010), p. 169 [s.z., 175]: “idle talk, curiosity, and ambiguity characterize the way in which dasein is its ‘there,’ the disclosedness of being-in-the-world, in an everyday way. as existential determines, these characteristics are not objectively present in dasein; they constitute its being. in them and in the connectedness of their being, a basic kind of the being of everydayness reveals itself, which we call the entanglement [verfallen] of dasein.” 94 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college complex, enmeshed web of actions wherein “many [ethical] wrongdoings are reactions to previous moral impediments within a web” and therefore cannot be taken in isolation (56-57). the moral impediment thesis, perhaps the most significant argument of part i, articulates the structural analysis of the terminality of being and the ser/estar distinction within the project of negative ethics. in brief, any act of positive value creation, at the estar ‘level’ of human being, is never an isolated activity but one whose situation is always enmeshed within a larger complex of other human actions, thereby making it impossible to consider all of the feelings, interests, and projects of every other (61). therefore, cabrera concludes, the human situation is structured such that moral impediment is not accidental, but necessary with respect to all intra-structural actions (62). in part ii, cabrera works to extend and apply the ontological work of part i to the realm of normative ethics regarding the morality (or lack thereof ) of procreation, childhood education, sexuality, abortion, and suicide. though each chapter is thoughtprovoking, i will only focus on the question of procreation (in chapters 9-12), which cabrera describes as “the primary ethical question,” due to its centrality, both within this book and cabrera’s wider corpus of work (118). in defense of even calling to question the morality of procreation, cabrera frames the issue being “deeply motivated by a very strong and responsible concern for potential children, and for the risk that their emergence into being is the consequence of constraining and aggressive actions against defenseless human beings” (ibid). the act of procreation, cabrera maintains, is for the sake of the parents, and not the child, in order to give the parents some ‘good’— i.e., the joy, pleasure, or happiness of parenthood—which he describes as a mere act of the progenitor’s positive value creation, and one this is morally irresponsible given the aforementioned structures of the terminality of being and the moral impediment thesis (120). in chapters 10-12, cabrera develops what his calls the “proc thesis,” by recourse to two “minimal demands” of the mea. cabrera finds traditional ethical theory to contain the “do no harm demand” (nhd) and the “do not manipulate demand” (nmd) (126).5 cabrera’s proc thesis argues that, if the nhd and the nmd are indeed ethical demands, then procreation, as an intentional or unintentional act, is not ethically justifiable as it violates both the nhd and the nmd (121). he argues, first, that procreation is a manipulative activity, because procreation is an act of the progenitors’ creation of positive value, wherein the child is a means for that act’s satisfaction (129130). cabrera then argues that procreation is an inherently harmful act because: [1] the structure of life is terminal, and therefore birth is a structural “disadvantage;” [2] in flight from the terminal structure of their beings, humans inevitably cause harm to others in order to survive; and [3] there is no structural guarantor of successful reactive value creation, and, in fact, many humans fail in this endeavor (139-140). 5 roughly, cabrera explains the nhd and nmd as: assuming the reciprocity of consideration under the mea, we ought to pursue our projects, feelings, and interests only insofar as they do not harm any other, obstruct another’s own projects, or place any other in a situation of possible harm or constraint—when possible, we should actively try to rescue others from their situations of harm and constraint. further, we should not manipulate any other in service of our own ends. 95issue vi ◆ spring 2019 review of discomfort and moral impediment (julio cabrera) cabrera considers a variety of objections to the proc thesis, but directs most of his argumentative force against the position advocating an intrinsic value to life. here, again, he invokes the ser/estar distinction, arguing that the majority of these “affirmative” arguments “forget” this very distinction, and consequently mistake estarlevel value in human life to be demonstrative of structural, ser-level value to human life (143-151). further, cabrera argues that these same objectors erroneously conclude, from the impetus for survival driving the process of positive value creation, that there is a structural vitality to human being, rather than regarding it as “a mere question of animal impulse” (147). thirdly, even for “sensitive progenitors”—i.e., those who are cognizant of human life’s terminality, yet decide to have a child, in hopes that their child succeeds in positively resisting terminality(149-150)—procreation remains “one of the most powerful mechanisms of intra-world value creation, and therefore of postponing and distancing the terminal structure of being” (155). this, cabrera concludes, raises the fundamental question for ethics: do we have the right to procreate for the sake of our own resistance to our own inevitable decay of being (156)? though cabrera’s arguments in part i, and what has been discussed of part ii may appear to be formally valid, the project as a whole appears to be contingent upon the success of, or the reader’s assent to, the structural argument for the terminality of being and the incommensurability of positive value on the ‘estar-status’ to its ‘ser-status.’ at least as how i understand it, it would seem that the possibility for positive value creation at the level of a particularized human being is not operative at the structural level, and is therefore created ex nihilo in all individuated human beings. in the development of his proc thesis, cabrera states that he “agree[s] substantially” with the approach of “existential metaphysics,” in the tradition of schopenhauer, nietzsche, sartre, and heidegger, only insofar as they endorse the “idea that there are constant and regular structures of human life, and that it is not true that every human birth begins from nothing” (152). yet, here, there seems to be an explicit structural irregularity, or, at least, incongruity between the ser and estar designations of human being: how could it be the case that every human being is “forced” to engage in the creation of positive values without having any structural condition for the possibility of valuation, at all. on this question, heidegger, whose ontological work features prominently all throughout cabrera’s text, examines the fundamentally holistic being of human-being through its inseparable and non-distinct “multiplicity of constitutive structural factors,” which he calls “existentials.”6 above, i indicated the similarity between cabrera’s analysis of positive value creation and heidegger’s existential of falling prey [verfallen]. however, falling prey is the ontical modality of (i.e., estar-level), and presupposes, dasein’s ontological structure of sein-bei, translated as either “being together with” or “rendering things meaningfully present” in the world.7 in order to commit ourselves to the project of intra-structural (or innerworldly) positive value creation, there must first be, ontologically, the structural ability to encounter any-thing within the world 6 heidegger, being and time, pp. 53-54 [pp.53-54]. 7 the former translation appears in the stambaugh translation of being and time, whereas thomas sheehan offers the latter. see sheehan, making sense of heidegger: a paradigm shift, (lanham: rowan and littlefield pub., 2014), p. 150. 96 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college as something that has been made meaningfully present to us, before we are able to appropriate these innerworldly beings into our projects. cabrera, in discussing the ser/ estar distinction, defined a third term, “estanes,” as the “beings that ‘are there’ (material things, ideas, films, animals, institutions or numbers),” that we use for the purposes of positive value creation (27). cabrera did not, however, locate the ontological possibility of our having these estantes as something meaningfully present and available to us, in the first place, nor, presupposing their meaningful presence, did he discuss why these estantes are even taken up within the process of positive value creation. on this account, then, it seems particularly odd that cabrera dismisses human being’s “animal desire” to live as something wholly incidental in relation to the structural determination of human being, and therefore lacking in any intrinsic value (161). on further consideration, this “animal desire” appears to be the only possible way of reconciling the problematic spontaneous generation of human being’s entire familiarity with the notion of “value” and relevance at the estar-level. yet this would cut against cabrera’s thesis that life is structurally valueless by admitting of an apparent structural regularity of organic vitality. if admitted, this structural feature would ground the human capacity for positive value creation in an original, value-laden relation that one has toward the being of one’s own life, which, therefore, hardly appears to be intrinsically valueless. this, however, appears to challenge cabrera’s original thesis—viz., that no thorough argumentation has been offered in support of the intrinsic value of human life—insofar as, now, the being of human life is the principle of value, or in other words, human life is structurally en-valuation, on which all consequent acts of particular value creation are contingent. thus, given the ontological structure of cabrera’s negative ethics, the aforementioned questions likely problematize cabrera’s normative ethical conclusions about procreation, without, of course, amounting to complete rejection thereof. ◆ 97issue vi ◆ spring 2019 δι αν οι α 8 δι αν οι α interview with dermot moran the joseph chair in catholic philosophy 9issue vii ◆ spring 2020 interview with dermot moran dianoia conducted an interview with dermot moran, the joseph chair in catholic philosophy and current chair of the department of philosophy. joining boston college in 2017 after serving as the gadamer visiting professor in 2015, he is currently the president of the international federation of philosophical studies/fédération internationale des sociétés de philosophie (fisp) and founding editor of ‘the international journal of philosophical studies’ (1993). moran’s research areas include medieval philosophy (especially christian platonism) and contemporary european philosophy (especially phenomenology), and he is the author of nine monographs, fifteen edited books, and hundreds of journal articles and book chapters. dianoia: could you describe what phenomenology is and say a little about its founder edmund husserl? moran: well first of all, i always emphasize that phenomenology is an approach rather than a strict method. edmund husserl, who is the founder of phenomenology and the logical investigations (1900), really wanted a strict method and a method that would underline all the other sciences. it would be a scientific method to beat all scientific methods, that was his idea. and of course, his famous slogan was “back to the things themselves” since he wanted a descriptive science that describes how our consciousness encounters the world in the manner that it presents itself. it was meant to be a transparent description of our experience in its full richness, but his methodology was very much contested even by his own students (e.g. heidegger, merleau-ponty, and others), so his bracketing method, his method of pure description evolved. so i rather see phenomenology as still having this attention to the rich detail of our experience, but there are many different methodologies within an overall approach. but the overall approach is anti-speculative, anti-theorizing and just staying with the experiences, or phenomena in the broadest sense. so for example, how we experience an art object, how we interrelate with others in the lifeworld, these are all things that we need to describe in—as husserl would put it—an unprejudiced manner. dianoia: what’s the distinction between husserl’s pure phenomenology and what came with his followers in developing existential phenomenology, and who are some of the figureheads of each group? moran: husserl had a huge number of very loyal followers, especially in the early phase, and they’re often called the realist phenomenologists since they wanted to have phenomenology as a kind of realist description of the world; they really tried to overcome pre-judgment and prejudice. but once you have heidegger coming along—the founder of existential phenomenology—he’s the thinker that says there’s no such thing as pure description, that all description is interpreted, and thereby gives a hermeneutical or interpretive phenomenology. but he also wanted to expand husserl's interest in the body and consciousness, i.e. the body and the subject, to a 10 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college much broader interest in concrete human existence. that’s really what inspires sartre, merleau-ponty and beauvoir to take up this notion of existence. dasein literally means existence. so heidegger is saying phenomenology is an analysis of dasein’s being-inthe-world, that becomes translated by the french as a description of our concrete existence. so i would say that you could find a lot of that in husserl, especially in the later husserl. and yet, it’s very difficult to tell whether heidegger’s influencing husserl or if it’s the other way around since both were in daily contact for ten years. heidegger didn’t publish much and husserl didn’t publish much from 1917 to 1927 so we only have their notes, and consequently, it’s hard to tell. but both of them start moving more and more to the idea of historically-invented being-in-the-world, which is also limited by time since it is finite—so we are finite beings located in a specific situation. right now we are in the middle of the 21st century, so that alters our engagement in the world. so those factors, that being-in-the-world shapes our encounter in the world and means that there’s no pure and direct, unmediated experience. experience is always mediated by our beliefs, customs, habits, practices and so on. that’s the big shift i think. dianoia: you mention “philosophical bracketing” or the epoché—how might we apply this and other phenomenological tools to everyday or quotidian phenomena? moran: well, i think husserl himself picked it up from the ancient skeptics, and he sees it as an archetypal philosophical practice, and the practice is that of withholding assent. that’s how the skeptics saw it. when you have two propositions that both seem to be true, let’s say the democrats are doing a good job in handling the environment, and on the other side is, the republicans are doing a very good job in keeping the economy open. these are not exactly contradictory, but they are two opposing views. and when you are faced with that, the ancient skeptics thought that in the absence of confirming evidence for one or the other we should withhold assent. so husserl thinks that broadly speaking the epoché is a bracketing, or withholding of assent or a withdrawal of commitment, and that means we can take a much more detached look at our own experience. so that’s the really key point—he thinks that we need to take the non-participating observer stance to our own experience, and i think we can all benefit from that. standing back from our immediate engagement with things, and then trying to take a stance above our experience and look at it. this is the job of the transcendental spectator, and even though other philosophers like heidegger rejected the idea of a transcendental ego, they still are engaged in that kind of ‘sideways look on at our own existence.' when heidegger says that most of our existence is caught up in everydayness, how do you know that unless you kind of step out of that experience and are looking at it from another perspective? so i think yes, the phenomenological epoché is a practice of disengaging from our immediate tendencies, beliefs, affirmations, confirmations and of adopting a much more nonengaged scrutiny of our experience with the hope that it will yield a lot more genuine 11issue vii ◆ spring 2020 interview with dermot moran evidence. dianoia: in light of the coronavirus outbreak, how does our perception of the virus shape its impact on the world in both a social and political sense, and how might the phenomenological reduction (or any other phenomenological concepts) bring clarity to public discourse? moran: i’ve been thinking about that a lot because i actually have spent time in wuhan—i was a visiting professor there three years ago, and have very good friends there who have given me firsthand information about their lives and about the changes in their lives. i think initially people in the west thought about this as a local problem in china, and there was a lot of misinformation initially; for example, that covid-19 was no worse than the common flu, or that some would build immunity to it, but in fact it’s ten times more deadly than the seasonal flu. furthermore, for the flu there’s a vaccine, but for covid-19 there’s none. and so the authorities were very slow in moving forward, it was like a tidal wave starting in china and korea, and then showing up in italy, spain, france and then the uk and america. so each country had time to see what was happening, and quite honestly, they should have moved earlier. but what it does show, and i think this is really from the phenomenological point of view, is that first of all we live in one common technological world. i mean this was a virus that was spread by air travel, this was spread by people using airplanes, and so, this was highly mobile because our societies are highly mobile. secondly, it’s been interesting to see that many of the things that we thought belonged to our everyday life we just took so much for granted (so this a good example of the epoché). so we just took all of normal life for granted, completely. in other words, we are living in the natural attitude and we just assume things like public transport and restaurants being open, being able to visit friends, all of those things we just took for granted. and our everyday life that we thought was so boring and uninteresting is really vital. and we’re all missing it now, and so this is a chance for us to realize that this supposedly inauthentic everyday natural life that we had isn’t just always there, but is a fragile human construct that’s threatened by things like this global pandemic. so we have to be very careful to guard our social realities, and to make sure that they come back. there’s big debates about opening public parks because people that live in crowded conditions don’t have public spaces to exercise in. but you also don’t want the public parks to be crowded, so there’s a fine balance to be drawn. but the reason parks were brought in during the 19th century was to provide people who lived in cramped urban conditions with public spaces to get exercise, to get fresh air and all of these things. i’ve started teaching camus’ the plague, and i had forgotten until the virus came along how camus had extraordinary foresight and described exactly the situation that we’re in currently. i’ll just read you a small passage from the plague, “once plague had shut the gates of the town, they had settled down to a life of separation, debarred from the living warmth that gives forgetfulness of all. in 12 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college different degrees in every part of the town, men and women had been yearning for a reunion, not of the same kind for all, but for all alike ruled on it. most of them longed intensely for an absent one, or for the warmth of a body, for love, or merely for the life and habit that they had endured. some, often without knowing it, suffered from being deprived of the company of friends and from their inability to get in touch with them through the usual channels of friendship (e.g. letters, trains, and boats).” that’s kind of a short description of the loss of the everyday social contact that this brings, that camus describes extraordinary well, and that the only response—the response of the doctor—is to do your job, to face up to your responsibilities and to try and do your part in restoring this human life as best as we can. dianoia: when we eventually do return to normalcy, what lasting effects do you think that the coronavirus and social distancing will have on society? moran: i’ve been reading giogio agamben’s book the state of exception, and it was written after 9/11 in 2005, and it was about the various forms of political and social control brought in allegedly as emergency circumstances, which become part of the new normal. and i was also reading slavoj zizek’s new book pandemic!, and it says a lot of the same things that as philosophers we have to be careful of. it’s certainly true that many things are introduced as emergency measures and then they never go away again. the classic example is income tax—introduced as an emergency measure during the civil war to pay for it, and it’s never gone away because this was a great way of extracting money from the people. and one of the things that worries me most, and it’s always a two-edged sword, is that modern technological means of social control, which are largely done by using your phone’s geolocation, are being used very widely in china to monitor people’s movements. and yet, the good part of this is that it stops people who are in contact with the virus from spreading it any further. google and amazon are posing a similar thing here, so that you could get a text in the morning saying that you had been in contact with someone who had the virus and then you should quarantine. but in china it’s gotten to the point where they have to scan codes when they go into different buildings or when they go into certain streets, and you could be locked out if you’re on the list of people that’s been exposed. so you suddenly go into a society of total control, and that’s terribly worrying from the point of view of social and political liberties. but again, we have to face that all this information is out there, and if they wanted, the people running the zoom platform could tell that the three of us are on their app now, extract what exactly we’re talking about, and they could even locate us from our phones—all of that information builds up. but virus tracing efforts need that information, so this is that double-edged sword that heidegger talks about concerning technology—it’s created the framework inside which we live. we just have to be very careful that we know the essence of this technological enframing, and until we know what it’s doing to us in the long-term, we won’t really be able to get the right attitude towards it. 13issue vii ◆ spring 2020 interview with dermot moran clearly we can’t just be luddites, but we also can’t blend completely into the security state as agamben calls it. the long term impact will be this idea of the security state and ‘the state of exception’ that agamben discusses. on the other side, we have to be aware of the people that are protesting any kind of a lockdown and gathering with their second amendment rights and their guns to say “nobody’s going to tell me what to do” (that’s a pretty american phenomenon by the way). but it is an example that comes from a deep-seated suspicion of anything having to do with the state, whether it be anarchist or libertarian in nature. the state is always repressive for these groups, so i think that at the end of the day we have to go somewhere in-between these two ideologies. it does raise all kinds of issues about political phenomenology, and this will lead us as a final point, it makes us focus on the nature of the life-world and how the life world is being mediated and structured by technological infringement. and they’re surely the central issues that husserl and heidegger and merleau-ponty were talking about. from that point of view i think phenomenology is totally relevant to our discussions today. dianoia: you’re an active member in mediating the dialogue between continental and analytic philosophy. can you explain the difference between these two camps? moran: well i wrote an article on it one time saying that “our germans are better than your germans,” because the origins of analytic philosophy are german-speaking philosophers like carnap or others in the vienna circle. i say german because they spoke in german, wrote in german, they were either in germany or austria. carnap, schlick and the vienna circle generally moved into america and influenced others like quine and a.j. ayer. analytic philosophy then grew out from that breed of german scientific thought of the 20th century whereas husserl and heidegger influenced people like gadamer, arendt, sartre, merleau-ponty, beauvoir, kristeva and the more european thinkers that you tend to associate with continental philosophy. so i don't like the terms continental and analytic, but i do think there are different tendencies between thinkers of the 20th century, and what split them politically was the war— this much is clear. phenomenology became associated with nazi germany though heidegger, and actually, a lot of the vienna circle people were jews who had fled the nazi regime, so they were very hostile not just to nazism, but to anything that they thought was associated with it—and that included heideggerian phenomenology in particular. but in the 21st century, we have to realize that both methods are really intersecting; in fact, cognitive science these days is a mixture of both continental and analytical methods. and also it’s a lot to do with people’s interests. if you go back to aristotle and plato, plato wrote dialogues, which were very literary products, and aristotle wrote these more textbook style lectures. and that’s interesting too, continental people tend to be more interested in the arts and literature, and analytic philosophers often want to be piggybacking on science, mathematics, logic and so on. so i don’t like it when people think that one is better than the other, and i do 14 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college think they cover different aspects of the human experience. so i like to see room for both, but of course, as we know, because of the very complicated forms of technical language that have developed in the traditions, there’s very little genuine dialogue between them and i've been at it for a long time. in the end, i decided that what’s been going on are parallel conversations. so rather than people talking to each other, they’re talking about each other in parallel conversations, and that’s about as best as we can do. dianoia: another one of your areas of specialization is medieval philosophy—what initially attracted you to the subject and can you fathom a scenario wherein it would be in dialogue with phenomenology? moran: i was really trying to write a dissertation on heidegger for my phd in 1976 when he died, and everybody said that there was this massive gesamtausgabe of collected works coming out, and that it was supposed to be the second part of being and time with all of these manuscripts making current heidegger research impossible. so now we’ve had one-hundred volumes of gasamtausgabe and i'm not really sure it’s changed all that much because people still read being and time! but at the time i wanted to work on heidegger, and when he died, my supervisor said i shouldn't really work on him. i had a background from my undergraduate days in medieval philosophy, and i knew heidegger had. so i said i want to work on a heideggerian theme (viz. the forgetfulness of being in the history of philosophy in the medieval period) and that’s what led me to meister eckhart. i discovered that one of eckhart’s sources was john scottus eriugena, on whom i eventually wrote my phd. so, in lots of ways, i was kind of emulating heidegger (who wrote on thomas of erfurt for his habilitation) and writing about a medieval scholar and trying to answer contemporary questions. of course, it made me kind of an object of suspicion both by the heideggerians and the medievalists, so it was hard for me to keep these two different pathways of research open and in dialogue with each other. a lot of the medieval people were philologists and classicists who really didn’t want to talk about anything after the middle ages, or bring in any ideas from hegel or heidegger, or whoever. and similarly, phenomenologists wanted to talk about contemporary issues, and didn’t want to talk out the history of philosophy. but it’s changing, jeanluc marion is an example of someone who’s written on both as well, or claude romano who was here this past semester as our visiting gadamer professor. ◆ conducted on april 20th, 2020. διανοιαd i a n o i athe undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college spring 2020 issue vii διανοια editor-in-chief: noah valdez senior managing editor: ethan yates managing editors: nicholas arozarena, weitao liu, lauren white general editors: nicholas avallone, kathryn bryson, jacob browning, carolyn chang, yang cheng, benjamin dewhurst, lucy hanson, emily haverstick, wenyu huang, qihui liu, yue liu, elizabeth lopreiato, alexandria mullen, jacob schick, drew thorburn, maxwell vogliano external reviewers: arabella adams (wellesley college), nathan evans (university of northern colorado), tyler hruby (carleton college), tristan st. germain (brown university) graduate advisor: peter klapes faculty advisor: ronald tacelli, s.j. cover designs courtesy of gregory kacergis. featuring: nicolae jon grigorescu andreescu à barbizon 1879; obtained via wikimedia commons. isaac whitehead in milford sound, west coast, new zealand 1878; obtained via wikimedia commons. the materials herein represent the personal opinions of the individual authors and do not necessarily represent the views of dianoia or boston college. if you have questions regarding the journal, would like to submit your work for review, or if you’d be interested in joining next year’s staff, please contact the journal at dianoia@bc.edu or visit our website at dianoiabc.org. dianoia the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college spring 2020 issue vii boston college 140 commonwealth avenue chestnut hill, ma 02467 https://www.bc.edu/bc-web/schools/mcas/departments/philosophy/undergraduate/dianoia.html © 2020 the trustees of boston college 81issue v f spring 2018 δι αν οι α language and signs in heidegger’s what is called thinking jon stuart victor “we are a sign that is not read.” –hölderlin to analyze the ways in which humans relate to being is to examine the extent to which they are alone in the world. the death of god, announced by friedrich nietzsche in aphorism 125 of “the gay science,” threatened the loss of being forever, a loss that martin heidegger acutely felt as he strove to reframe humanity’s relation to the metaphysical.1 the task, at times, feels gloomy. for if a human being is a sign—as heidegger states—he exists only in relation to something else, something that, friedrich hölderlin says, does not even read the sign. for as we turn to meet being in all its glory and completeness, we find that being has withdrawn from us. we are left alone. “we are a sign that is not read.” heidegger introduces this line from hölderlin early in his text, what is called thinking? he lets it stand before the reader, moving on to discuss the nature of the poetic word, rather than explaining its philosophical utility. one is, indeed, left with questions. why are we not read? what could read us in the first place? i believe that heidegger says that we are a sign that is not read in order to highlight precisely the extent to which being has withdrawn from us, forming an analogy between the linguistic sign and our pointing toward being. whereas the linguistic sign’s referent meets it where it lies, being has turned away from humanity, leaving it to point 1 nietzsche, friedrich. "the gay science, translated by walter kaufmann." new york: vintage 374 (1974): 181. 82 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college aimlessly into oblivion, as a sign without significance—a sign that is not read. in the same sense that we cannot think until we know what it is that calls us to thought (or so heidegger says), we cannot be a sign that is read until we can access the sign’s signifier—the thing it points to. in this case, what we are pointing to has turned away from us long ago. while heidegger explores several modalities of being, such as thinking, memory and traveling, as part of his discussion on human being, perhaps no modality is as illuminative of what a human being is as his comparisons of humans to language. the philosopher’s conception of the human being as a sign establishes a relationship between humans and being that he says must always be present, even if the withdrawal of one side threatens how each interacts with the other. heidegger writes, “man is the being who is in that he points toward ‘being,’ and who can be himself only as he always and everywhere refers himself to what is.”2 the relationship between humanity and being is one of essence, but the essence is signification, which, in turn, implies separation. humans, as beings, are necessarily separate from being insofar as they must constantly be referring themselves to it in order to partake in its essence. as a linguistic sign has no meaning (except that which it receives from the real-world object to which it points), humans must constantly refer themselves to being, and, in this way, they must reinforce their essential separation from it. in other words, like any sign, humans receive their meaning only by virtue of their separation from their signifier—being. we are a sign that is not read. of hölderlin’s statement, however, what is even less clear is what might read this “human sign”, and how it is be done. heidegger, in discussing the movement of being as either drawing toward, or away from, human beings, appears to suggest that to ‘read’ a sign is to engage with it on a fundamental level. heidegger invites this broad interpretation of the word “read,” as he refers to a sign beyond an image or a written word, such as items of thought or beings who “point” in their relation to being. for one to read a sign like a road sign—that is one thing. to read a sign that is a human being pointing toward being in its essential nature—that is another. heidegger recognizes the complexity of the task at hand and offers some clarifying words, in which he provides the withdrawal of being and its existence beyond the scope of our language as justifications for why we are not read. he writes: “when man is drawing into what withdraws, he points into what withdraws. as we are drawing that way we are a sign, a pointer. but we are pointing then at something which has not, not yet, been transposed into the language of our speech. we are a sign that is not read”.3 here it seems that heidegger believes that for a sign to be read, it must point to a thing that, in turn, meets it and coexists with it on some level of existence. the semantic correspondence between the word or idea of a tree and the actual tree itself creates meaning for the sign. yet, if the tree were to reject definition, 2 heidegger, martin. "what is called thinking?, trans." j. glenn gray (new york: perennial library, 2004), 149. 3 ibid., 18. 83issue v f spring 2018 language and signs or otherwise escape human understanding, the sign would not be read. we draw into what withdraws, and escape the language of our speech. as such, we are a sign that is not read. this withdrawal, however, is by no means permanent—the idea that we are a sign presupposes the possibility of our pointing’s eventually reaching the thing to which we aspire. heidegger acknowledges this in his inclusion of the words “not yet” when describing how being has eluded our faculty of language. set off by commas, the phrase is, rhetorically, something of a side note to the idea that what we draw toward withdraws from us. the phrase is hopeful. heidegger believes in humanity’s ability to reach being, and to receive meaning from the thing that gives us our essence, insofar as we point toward it. indeed, he reinforces this hope through his constant assurances that we are still not thinking, rather than just not thinking. heidegger also does not think that our inability to reach being is entirely our fault either, stating, “that we are still not thinking is by no means only because man does not yet turn sufficiently toward that which, by origin and innately, wants to be thought about since in its essence it remains what must be thought about. rather, that we are still not thinking stems from the fact that the thing itself that must be thought about turns away from man, has turned away long ago.”4 this idea reinforces the dual aspect of our search to find being, as it requires a bidirectional relationship: as humans point toward being, so too must being point toward us. heidegger could build on hölderlin’s verse, in saying that we are a sign that is still not read, even though, perhaps, we once were. the temporariness of this uniquely human condition—that we still have not met being in such a way that allows us to be read—is in no small part due to language’s having prevented humans from engaging, on an essential level, with being. for although the human being as a pointer makes him similar to the linguistic sign, a relation to being requires a more fundamental engagement, which cannot be hindered by the constrictions set in place by language. heidegger is deeply troubled by the completeness and finality of meaning that language purports to provide, and throughout what is called thinking?, strives to redefine ordinary words and lines from other writers. nonetheless, this unusual process of translation, for heidegger, is only getting to the true meanings of words (or moving closer to their relationship with being), as language is, itself, a collection of bungled signs. heidegger writes: “it is not we who play with words, but the nature of language plays with us, not only in this case, not only now, but long since and always. it is as though man had to make an effort to live properly with language. it is as though such a dwelling were especially prone to succumb to the danger of commonness”.5 this commonness, and this dwelling, are what prevent humanity and being from fully aligning. we live inside language, and therefore, cannot interact with aspects of the world that go beyond its scope. in the spirit of heidegger, hölderlin’s line may become: we point 4 ibid., 6-7. 5 ibid., 118-119. 84 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college but are waiting for that metaphysical principle to which we point to point back to us. we are waiting for being to meet us where we are. for it do so, we must allow it to. by redefining our relationship to being, we are freeing ourselves to more directly seek being, and vice versa. up until now, we have discussed pointing as a form of striving, which implies that signs are in some way not partaking in being, but are, rather, outside of it. according to heidegger, signs, being permitted to partake in a relationship with their signifier, can become conjoined with the essence of their signifier, and, in that way, they become as necessary a part of its existence as anything. heidegger’s description of the characteristics of language can be applied to humans, as they relate to being: “language admits of two things: one, that it be reduced to a mere system of signs, uniformly available to everybody, and in this form be enforced as binding; and two, that language at one great moment says one unique thing, for one time only, which remains inexhaustible because it is always originary, and thus beyond the reach of any kind of leveling”.6 by signs’ being “uniformly available to everybody,” heidegger seems to say that they contain no original reality, which, in its specificity, could render the sign inaccessible or unreadable to anyone. as such, the sign is binding—in other words, it receives its essence from its signifier. for humans, this would mean that our pointing toward being binds us with it in an essential way. the crux of the second characteristic is perhaps even more obscure, but an understanding of it may be found in the word “originary,” which can mean “primitive” or “productive.” in the sense of “primitive,” language may be originary in that it originated long ago in humans — at the same time that heidegger says being turned away from us. heidegger may also be saying that language is productive, yielding new meaning with each utterance. yet, while any combination of signs can yield new meaning, there can be only one relationship of sign to signifier. language as a combination of signs is constantly productive, but the relation of sign to signifier, or of human to being, is transcendent, in that it is fixed in its singular meaning. given this discussion of language, we may be in some position to examine the two lines that directly succeed our aforementioned line from hölderlin’s poem: “we feel no pain, we almost have/ lost our tongue in foreign lands”.7 in hölderlin’s words, we seem to be in the realm of language. the verse mentions losing one’s tongue—a reference to shedding the constraints of language, and, as a result, feeling no pain (i.e., being transcendent). in that way, the passage describes our search for being. the word “almost” weighs heavily on the pair of lines, as it refers to humanity’s asymptotic approach towards being—a necessary characteristic of which being humans’ withdrawnness from being. heidegger does not explicate these lines for us, which raises questions about why he chose to include them. but while they could be read as describing transcendence, they are more likely to be referring to 6 ibid, 191-192. 7 ibid., 10. 85issue v f spring 2018 language and signs humanity’s conundrum of not being able to relate properly to being. indeed, the lines are indicative of a sense of alienation that accompanies the sign that “stays without interpretation”.8 that we are in “foreign lands” reflects the unreciprocated relationship between humanity and being. one might read the phrase “our tongue” not literally as “language,” but rather as some essential characteristic of our being that is lost, having been corrupted by the “dwelling” in which we have had to make an effort to live. language is likely to be the “foreign lands” to which heidegger refers, as it is clear that he does not think of language as something that comes naturally to humans. the “tongue” that hölderlin speaks of, at least for heidegger, is something much more essential and closely tied to being than language is. heidegger warns against succumbing to the commonness of language, making this more broad interpretation of the word “tongue” a more consistent way of thinking about how he might view these lines. as we remain without interpretation, we remain separated from that in which we may be at home—being. in subsequent lines of his discussion of the poem, heidegger derives great meaning from one of its various titles, “mnemosyne,” which is the name of a titaness in an ancient greek myth. heidegger’s view of the poem’s character as myth-like is a form of reflecting on the nature of myth-telling. “myth means the telling word,” he writes. “for the greeks, to tell is to lay bare and make appear—both the appearance and that which has its essence in the appearance, its epiphany.”9 it would seem initially that telling as “laying bare” contradicts what we have said before about language as obfuscating. laying bare means to expose, reveal, uncover. but telling is not only laying bare—it is also making appear, which is distinct from exposure in that the latter refers to what has always been there, or at least once was and now is again. given that being turned away from us long ago, it remains that thing which, for heidegger, is most important to expose, or to acquire anew. by turning toward being, we call it to appear to us—to reveal itself to us. we want it to point back to us. being has its essence in this epiphany, which occurs through pointing. for the greeks, telling is the thing that exposes being: “the mythos is that appeal of foremost and radical concern to all human beings which makes man think of what appears, what is in being”.10 the act of telling implies a listener—a relationship. the exposure comes in the act of telling: telling is the mark of a sign that reaches for a signifier. to describe more accurately the relationship between language and telling, heidegger employs the terminology of lying and letting lie, which, in turn, gives us new latitude to think about the ways in which we point to being. we have thus drawn a distinction between language, which confuses our search for being, and telling, which is an act that uses language to connect otherwise discrete elements. telling, or stating, is parallel to the pointing-towards done by the sign, which heidegger 8 ibid. 9 ibid. 10 ibid. 86 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college says we are. for heidegger, language is something that we bring into the world by uncovering it and letting it lie: “the essential nature of stating is not determined by the phonetic character of words as signs. the essential nature of language is illumined by the relatedness of what lies there before us to this letting-lie-before-us”.11 when we use language—when we employ it through stating or telling—we allow it to lie before us. it is in front of us, and we point towards it. it is with being. the essential nature of humanity’s relation to being may be summarized in the exact same terms that heidegger uses to characterize the essential nature of language. when we point toward being, we attempt to let it lie before us. but as it has turned away from us, it cannot lie before us, and rather lies outside of our grasp. a key question raised by the notion of lying and letting lie is how it applies to signs, and the interpretation of the sign by its signifier, such that it may be read. heidegger says that the letting lie of being is that essential trait that characterizes our experience: when man finds himself among what so lies before him, should he not respond to it in all purity by letting it lie before him just as it lies? and this letting-lie, would it not be that laying which is the stage for all the other laying that man performs? thus laying would now suddenly emerge as a relatedness that pervades man’s stay on this earth from the ground up— though we have never asked where this relatedness originates.12 the notion of origin emerges once more: similarly to heidegger’s description of language as originary, here the philosopher says that laying is something also originary, in that it must always be a characteristic of existence. humanity has always responded to the laying by letting-lie, which has constituted our attempts at relating to being. these have been successful attempts, as being, which withdraws, allows for something concrete that humanity can let lie. this is the act of withdrawal. but as we let being’s withdrawal lie before us, being does not turn to meet us, as would be necessary for a meaningful encounter. the relationship carries on one-sidedly, as it has since the beginning. in a way, by reproducing hölderlin’s words and by letting them lie on the page before the reader, heidegger is placing us on the path toward being by uncovering the truth of hölderlin’s words. we should have no confusion about what the poem is. the poem is language! its truth, therefore, should be muddled by that dwelling in which we live, which is essentially separate from our more fundamental relation to being. its words, however, point toward truth in the way that we point toward truth, and, as a result, show us along the path toward being: “its statement rests on its own truth. this truth is called beauty. beauty is a fateful gift of the essence of truth, and here truth means the disclosure of what keeps itself concealed”.13 heidegger believes 11 ibid., 202. 12 ibid., 206. 13 ibid., 19. 87issue v f spring 2018 language and signs that the disclosure of what keeps itself concealed—that is, being—is what provides its actuality and gives meaning and interpretation to that which seeks it. the sign is vindicated by the laying-bare of its signifier. similarly, the line, “we are a sign that is not read,” is itself a sign, which rests on its truth, in that it makes apparent the thing to which it points. we follow these pointers toward truth and being, heidegger says, and the alienation from being experienced by humanity comes as a result of being separated from this truth—the truth that being has taken with it in its withdrawal from us. being is, most fundamentally, the thing that does not make itself apparent to us. our greatest concern with it is that it is hidden—that it has turned away. somehow, heidegger says, this poem has used language to demonstrate its truth. but demonstrate is not exactly the correct word. he says that the poem “rests” on its truth, which does not imply laying-bare, but rather being hidden below the surface, as a house rests on a foundation that is underground. the language is a sign that points toward the truth. heidegger urges us to take this leap from language to truth—sign to signifier—in our search for being, as we point toward it and struggle to access it: “why this reference to language? in order to stress once again that we are moving within language, which means moving on shifting ground or, still better, on the billowing waters of an ocean”.14 the entire project of a sign is to transcend its order, to point toward something more actual than itself, and to have that thing meet it to create meaning. when we look for being, heidegger says, we are leaping out of something—in this case, language—and are landing on something that gives us our essential nature. we leap out of everything pertaining to our foreign linguistic dwelling, and we meet being so that it may meet us: “for that is what we are now, men who have leapt out of the familiar realm of science and even, as we shall see, out of the realm of philosophy. and where have we leapt? perhaps into an abyss? no! rather, onto some firm soil”.15 in understanding the nature and limits of language, we can hope to escape it. only then can we find being, resting upon its “firm soil,” and only then can being find us. f bibliography heidegger, martin. what is called thinking? trans. j. glenn gray. new york: perennial library, 2004. 14 ibid., 192. 15 ibid., 41. 19issue vi ◆ spring 2019 δι αν οι α the horror of the real: filmic form, the century, and fritz lang's m peter gavaris near the end of the century, alain badiou comes to the conclusion that “the art of the century inscribed itself paradigmatically between dance and cinema.”1 he never explains this development explicitly, though it can be reasoned that he arrived at this conclusion through a consideration of the immediacy inherent to the nature of both forms. evidently, dance and cinema share a fixation on dynamic movement, and for badiou, this distinguishes them from everything that came before, especially since the century “violently declares the present of art.”2 in what follows, i will focus specifically on cinema and the cinematic role as the essential art form of badiou’s century. i will begin by considering why film has been taken up by so many contemporary theorists, examining why the medium (seemingly defined by its constitutional conundrums) lends itself so easily to analysis, and conclude with a consideration of fritz lang’s m (1931), a film that embodies many of the central ideas presented in the century. cinema, from its conception at the end of the nineteenth century, differentiated itself first and foremost by the way it was to be consumed. unlike reading a book or looking at a painting, the act of watching a film always involves something of a 1 badiou, alain. the century, trans. alberto toscano. malden: polity, 2008, p. 160. 2 badiou, the century, 135 20 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college power dynamic in the way that it strips the viewer of autonomy. we cede all control when we enter the dark room, look up at the bright screen, and gaze as images unremittingly flash before us until the credits roll. conversely, we choose the pace at which to read a book; we can deliberate over certain words, re-read pages, and put the book down whenever we want. the same could be said of looking at a painting, since the act still leaves us with our autonomy. we can look away whenever we want, and the canvas is fundamentally static. given this essential difference, cinema aligns itself much more obviously with theatre, performance art, and dance, as badiou points out. these art forms originate from movements in a setting that requires us to relinquish control and from the construction of resemblance to our lives. this act of replication, whether it be naturalistic, expressionistic, or anything in between, is just that. apart from being far more democratic than theater or dance, film differentiates itself from these other forms in that its replication of life has greater potential for resembling life as it is, and duly, bears greater potential for abstraction. rather than watching the action play out in front of us with the naked eye—as is the case with these other forms of performance—cinema necessitates further layers of construction (and artifice) that are communicated by a director’s shot selection, the editing of scenes, among other things. when writing on film, walter benjamin observes: “the camera intervenes with the resources of its lowerings and liftings, its interruptions and isolations, its extensions and accelerations, its enlargements and reductions. the camera introduces us to unconscious optics as does psychoanalysis to unconscious impulses.”3 these “unconscious optics,” as benjamin puts it, come about through the dissonance between cinema’s base artificiality and its potential for capturing life in motion. consider the early lumière films that attempted to do just this. the arrival of a train (1896) is simply what its title implies (see figure 1). yet, it is much more than just that, since, as benjamin put it, “filmed behavior lends itself more readily to analysis because of its incomparably more precise statements of the situation […] it can be isolated more easily.”4 the same cannot be said for any other artistic form, even those that are movement-based, because it is the camera that imbues an image with meaning by subtracting something from it. life is at once imitated, and thusly, removed (indeed, benjamin would likely argue that “the aura” is that which is being removed). even in shooting life as it is (say, a train arriving at a station), the camera adds an unquantifiable number of variables to the equation: the shot angle, the shot length, the exposure, to name a few. these variables create a specific, irreplicable image for the camera frame. it is the frame itself that further complicates things. in many ways, shooting a film is an act of profound exclusion, since a shot is defined not only by what is in the frame, but also by what is excluded. a shot of a train 3 walter benjamin. “the work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction.” the norton anthology of theory and criticism, ed. vincent b. leitch. w. w. norton & company, inc., 2001: 1181. 4 benjamin, “the work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction,” 1180-1181. 21issue vi ◆ spring 2019 the horror of the real arriving at a station implicitly asks us to consider what is occurring outside of the frame. therefore, the frame is at once finite—and infinite—and this constitutive contradiction lies at the heart of the medium, which makes film the definitive art form of the century, and an object of curiosity for theorists like benjamin and badiou. figure 1 badiou takes up cinema’s infinite finitude in his chapter on “the infinite.” for him, cinema is almost deceitfully deceptive in its promise of showing us life as it is, and the harsh reality that the medium’s replication of life is wholly artificial. after all, what is cinema other than a series of still images flashed quickly before us in such a way as to imply movement? in any case, badiou’s conception of the real, which he correlates to the infinite, can never be replicated in art, including cinema: “the torment of contemporary art in the face of the infinite situates it between a programmatic forcing that announces the return of romantic pathos, on the one hand, and a nihilistic iconoclasm, on the other.”5 cinema is situated nicely at this crossroads, as i’ve explained, because it seems almost to hold these two conflicting ideals (a “romantic pathos” and a “nihilistic iconoclasm”) at once, in that its infinite quality only comes about in its shear finitude. every shot is utterly unique and cannot be replicated perfectly; yet, the shot’s artificial construction allows for said uniqueness. consciously or otherwise, every film carries with it this inherent contradictory, romantic promise of the infinite, which arises from its own formal limitations, as badiou acknowledges: “the infinite is not captured in form; it transits through form […] finite form can be equivalent to an infinite opening.”6 since the film’s form loudly announces its own ineptitude, we are pointed to this infinite opening more frequently than when engaging with other artistic forms. 5 badiou, the century, p. 155. 6 ibid., p. 155. 22 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college in exploring the dichotomy between art’s “romantic pathos” and “nihilistic iconoclasm,” badiou spends noticeably more time addressing the latter, focusing on how the “art of subtraction” renders the medium inoperative. (this exemplified by his lengthy analysis of malevich's white on white.) admittedly, art can function as a study of surfaces, critiquing its own medium while also incorporating narrative elements and interiority. as discussed, cinema intrinsically seems able to hold these two contradictory elements at once. badiou’s reluctance to take up film as an “art of subtraction” that does not inherently eschew interiority is somewhat disappointing. with that, this essay will henceforth attempt to amend this fact by applying a badiousian reading to m (1931), a film that succinctly embodies much of the theory presented in the century. a far cry from the early cinema of the lumière brothers, fritz lang’s m is one of heightened drama and hyperstylization, featuring exquisite sets, ostentatious camerawork, and dynamic performances. m’s formal qualities belong to the german expressionist movement. founded on the basis that abstraction could better emulate a sense of interiority than strict, naturalistic representation, expressionism draws attention to itself as artificial (and it makes perfect sense that a form predicated on artificiality would take up abstraction in such a way as to carve out a greater opening for the badiousian real to transit through). m’s expressionism seems far from the art of subtraction that badiou discusses in the century, and yet, it arrives at a similar impasse. expressionism and film go hand in hand precisely because cinema is expressionistic in nature, and lang’s film embodies this synthesis, as the apparent, meticulous construction of its images gives way to a newfound interiority. wedged between two world wars, m appears to present itself as a procedural, almost rudimentary, crime thriller about a string of child murders, before revealing itself to be an eerily prophetic critique of a society ready to embrace totalitarianism. the mystery of the story is not so much about the identity of the killer—who we learn early on is hans beckert (peter lorre)—but is rather about the lengths to which the residents of berlin will go to capture him. lang commits to highlighting the interconnectedness of the “society of the century,” showing how seemingly everybody (from the police force, to the crime bosses, and even the beggars) is working to get this man for a smattering of different and self-serving reasons. by the end, the crime bosses, helped by regular residents who form a sort of citizens’ tribunal, capture beckert. they conduct an unfair trial and commit to killing him before the authorities rush in to break up the party. all this comes after beckert gives a rousing monologue as the tortured killer, expressing in between shrieks and screams the compulsivity of his actions in a surprisingly affecting call for sympathy. this climactic sequence of the citizens’ trial and beckert’s pleading marks a key moment in the film where lang pulls the wool from our eyes and turns the table on the residents of berlin (see figures 2 & 3). badiou argues that war and extreme violence in the century come as 23issue vi ◆ spring 2019 the horror of the real a result of passion for the real: a stark idealism that requires violence before peace. in what will follow, i aim to argue that this passion for the real is not manifested in beckert’s compulsive kills, but is rather embodied in the citizens’ desire to “put [him] out of commission.”7 for the film’s residents of berlin, the real can only be actualized by exterminating this evil from within their own society. when outlining his method for approaching the century, badiou explains that he wants to examine “how the century thought its own thought.”8 i wish to do the same by considering lang’s film as an artifact of the century, a work of profound self-diagnosis that will provide further insight into how the century thought of itself. in the century, badiou seemingly co-opts the lacanian real to refer to that which is unsignifyable: “representation is a symptom (to be read or deciphered) of a real that it subjectively localizes in the guise of misrecognition.”9 the real, as conceived of, and explained by, badiou, refers to a plane of perfection that is perpetually out of reach, separated from us by a gap. nonetheless, this passion for the real inspires the destruction, subtraction, and formalization that seem only to manifest in either art or violence. idealism, more than anything else, becomes the driving force behind this passion for the real since the passion itself comes from a belief that the gap between semblance and real can be transcended. badiou explains this idea in relation to nazi thought before concluding that “passion for the real is devoid of morality […] extreme violence is therefore the correlate of extreme enthusiasm.”10 it, therefore, becomes paramount to acknowledge that nazism, or any other form of oppressive regime, bears an ideology. as horrific as it may sound, it is a fundamental optimism—that of attaining the real—that accounts for so much violence in the century that badiou claims is defined by its passion: “bad violence must be followed 7 lang, m. 8 badiou, the century, p. 3. 9 ibid., p. 49. 10 ibid., p. 63. figure 2 figure 3 24 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college by good violence, which is legitimated by the former […] the good war will put an end to the bad war.”11 in turn, it makes perfect sense to view berlin’s residents’ totalitarian, self-serving desire to kill beckert as a passion for the real. surely, the perversity of the situation manifests itself in the simple fact that the residents of berlin are acting reasonably—at least initially—when it comes to their desire to catch beckert (since he represents a legitimate threat to their society). their crusade, their “just war,” is justifiable up until the point at which society collectively decides that beckert is less than human and undeserving of justice. this almost casual change in mindset has profound consequences, as badiou explains, in that it accounts for much of the violence of the century: “the century's real problem is to be located in the linkage between ‘democracies’ and that which, after the fact, they designate as their other […] what needs to be undone is precisely this discursive procedure of absolution.”12 the film’s title refers to the chalk letter “m” (for murderer) slapped onto beckert’s back at one point in the film (see figure 4). this moment holds significant import in that it represents the moment when beckert is explicitly made to be other; he becomes the target. the citizens, in turn, find no issue in making beckert the ostensive other in accordance with the belief that his elimination will allow for a lasting peace: “the twentieth century's idea of war is that of the decisive war, of the last war.”13 it is this stark optimism—and an inability to see beyond the present moment and situation—that allows for this sort of barbarous, ideological collective consciousness to take shape. 11 ibid., p. 30. 12 ibid., p. 5. 13 ibid., p. 34. figure 4 25issue vi ◆ spring 2019 the horror of the real lang effortlessly makes us aware of this shifting subjectivity through the use of cinematic techniques that informs our internalization of the narrative. notice, for instance, the way most of the action is staged throughout the film. the scenes where beckert is being chased through the streets are shot using high-angle long shots (see figure 5). shots of this kind emphasize the smallness of these characters, making them appear almost like pawns in a game as they chase each other down corridors and dark alleys. the camera shoots them at a distance to represent the metaphorical distance established between these characters and the viewer. by the film’s conclusion, lang closes this distance, through his use of close-ups, in order to evoke our sympathy for this character. if the long shots before were meant to imply distance, then these close-ups, like the famous one of beckert pleading (see figure 6), are meant to elicit empathy and imply interiority. writing on the close-up shot, benjamin concludes: “with the close-up, space expands […] the enlargement of a snapshot does not simply render more precise what in any case was visible, though unclear: it reveals entirely new structural formations on the subject.”14 surely, the power of the film’s ending comes in our acknowledgement of the newly discovered structural formations of beckert’s character. notable, too, is the fact that we can only collapse this emotional distance as lang does in film: live performance cannot replicate the cinematic freedom that comes with using a camera. adding to the novelty of m is the fact that the crime bosses, and not the police, mastermind the plan to capture and to try beckert’s. we come to realize that the heightened police activity—brought about by beckert’s killings—thwarts the city’s criminal activity. in laying down this groundwork, lang sets up a strange sort of hierarchy wherein the police hold power over the criminals and the criminals hold power over beckert. they resort to a dangerous kind of absolution in the end, which 14 benjamin, “the work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction,” p. 1181. figure 5 figure 6 26 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college badiou vehemently warns against when writing on nazi ideology. he disapproves of those who simply consider nazism unthinkably evil, since this inability to acknowledge ideology (or interiority) often results in even more violence and horror. badiou explains: “to maintain that nazism is not a form of thought, or, more generally, that barbarism does not think, is to abet a process of surreptitious absolution.”15 we see this surreptitious absolution in the sheer cruelty of the criminals and other residents of berlin who put beckert on trial, and who laugh and jeer at the killer as he begs for his life. in a strange way, lang’s directorial method asks us to consider this killer’s thought—that is, to assume a basic sort of interiority. badiou writes of wanting to know how the century thinks of itself, and lang’s film almost seems to want to achieve the same thing. m not only thinks about the century, but it also goes further to criticize it in the midst of its happening. the “surreptitious absolution” taken up by the residents of berlin represents how ideology becomes collective, and, evidently, political. in m, passion for the real is addressed and brought to life by groups of smarmy men in smoke-filled rooms: the crime bosses, and also the police chiefs (see figure 7). ideology, under the guise of politics, forms amidst the few before it is promulgated to the masses. the central dichotomy, that between the thinking, ideologically protected residents and the barbarous beckert, is achieved through this absolution and enforced by the simple, undeniable fact that politics thinks itself just. a lone killer cannot have an ideology—or any sort of interiority—whereby a group of likeminded residents must be justified in their thinking since there are so many of them. badiou confirms this very suspicion: “politics, when it exists, grounds its own principle regarding the real, and is thus in need of nothing, save itself.”16 evidently, passion for the real acts both as a justification for a genuinely barbarous ideology, and as a way to self-legitimatize that which wields power. politics is self-serving, and this point is made explicit by the fact that those condemning beckert are, themselves, criminals too! this propensity of politics to “save itself ” calls to mind giorgio agamben’s theory of ‘bare life,’ whereby a sovereign-power must exclude—deem worthless—some other form of life in order to maintain its own hegemony: “[the] living being who, though being human, is excluded–and through this exclusion, included–in humanity, so that human beings can have a human life, which is to say a political life.”17 though, it’s unclear if agamben’s exclusive inclusivity of the sovereign-power/bare-life dichotomy requires bare-life to exist. is beckert ‘bare life’ if he is to be killed? even in death, does he live on as an emblem of the agambenian homo sacer for the politically minded residents of berlin? history mournfully reminds us that many of these same germans would find a new form of ‘sovereign power’ in the decade to follow. either way, in 15 badiou, 4. 16 ibid., p. 6. 17 agamben, giorgio. the use of bodies. edited by werner hamacher. translated by adam kotsko, stanford university press, 2016, p. 23. 27issue vi ◆ spring 2019 the horror of the real attempting to synthesize agambenian and badiousian theory, looking at lang’s film through the lens of both, i extrapolate a few notable points. first, i argue that this passion for the real is a justification—a kind of moral imperative—for agambenian ‘bare life.’ we can also determine that the specifics of ‘bare life’ as described by agamben, life whose biological existence is considered worthless, applies to badiou’s thoughts on politics. do all politics and ideologies subsist on rendering the other as homo sacer? badiou surely overlooked m because its expressionist sensibility flies in the face of the ‘art of subtraction’ that he champions in the century. and while his points on subtraction (the art of auto-interrogation) are made clear in the text, there remains something to be said about more mainstream art that still manages to interrogate these aspects of society. the closest m gets to modernism is in its jagged construction, which comes from its constantly shifting perspective, oscillating from the crime bosses, to the beggars, to beckert, to the police, and back again. take that as you may, but there is something tragic about the fact that lang’s film was widely seen—largely championed—and yet, failed to make the country of its origin aware of its demons. if badiou is correct in postulating that passion for the real manifests in the disjunctive synthesis between art and violence, than m proves, more than anything else, that this violence may overpower its artistic correlate. ◆ figure 7 28 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college bibliography agamben, giorgio. the use of bodies. edited by werner hamacher. translated by adam kotsko, stanford university press, 2016. badiou, alain. the century. translated by alberto toscano, polity, 2008. benjamin, walter. “the work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction.” the norton anthology of theory and criticism, edited by vincent b. leitch, w. w. norton & company, inc., 2001, pp. 1166–1186. lang, fritz, director. m. nero-film a-g, 1931. spring 2021 to the reader, welcome to issue viii of dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college! we hope that you have kept safe throughout the course of our fight against covid-19, and it is our pleasure and pride to present yet another installment of our journal. we were humbled to receive over two-hundred submissions from ninetynine different undergraduate institutions around the world, and have published what we believe, after countless hours of reading, discussion, and editing, are the six best and most thought-provoking essays. the subject-matter of these works range from: normative education to plutatch’s lives; subjectivity in kierkegaard to illusions and qualia; and virtue ethics to seyla benhabib’s work on discourse. thus, dianoia’s reputation as a diverse community of thinkers, committed to interinstitutional exchange, remains. alongside these essays you will also find an interview with professor gregory fried, who was kind enough to sit down with us last fall for a discussion over his book, because it is wrong: torture, privacy, and presidential power in the age of terror. this year, the managing board chose henry bacon’s twilight in the desert (1907) and alexander yakovlev’s in the desert of afghanistan (1931) as the journal’s front and back covers, respectively. the union of these two pieces—from bacon’s isolation to yakovlev’s horizon of community—is a fitting image for our gradual return to a pre-covid-19 lifestyle, and we enthusiastically look forward to holding future publication symposia in-person, to meetings on campus, and to seeing journal friends again, both old and new. in publishing the fruit of this year’s labor, i would be remiss if i did not thank the journal’s various patrons, advisors, and advocates for their support. with your generous aid and freely-given expertise, dianoia has flourished over the course of its decade-long existence, and today boasts a premier spot amongst undergraduate philosophy journals. to my senior managing editor, nicholas arozarena, and to my managing editors, brock daylor, melissa mao, and maxwell vogliano, you all have been nothing short of spectacular, and i am grateful for both your time and talents in crafting this year’s issue. to our graduate advisor, peter klapes, your judgment and sagacious input have guided the journal more times than i can count; without your efforts, dianoia would be nowhere close to the institutional endeavor that it is today. the philosophy department—in particular, dermot moran, paula perry, and sarah smith—deserves our heartfelt thanks for their assistance and hospitality; furthermore, we would also like to thank gregory fried both for his openness to an interview and for his insightful responses to our questions. to the institute for the liberal arts, we treasure your continued financial and legal support, and thank you for the opportunity, once again, to print the culmination of this year’s review. to arabella adams, our graphic designer, we are in awe of your artistry and digital adroitness, and greatly appreciate your patience in turning six essays into a fully-fledged journal. lastly, i would like to thank our general editorial board for their incisiveness, their philosophical acumen, and their persistence in creating this year’s issue. all of my gratitude goes out to you; the managing board and i are truly in your debt. 5issue viii ◆ spring 2021 a l e t t e r f r o m t h e e d it o r 6 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college as a senior, i will be leaving dianoia after four years of service. my time on the journal has been the highlight of my undergraduate career, and to any future editor-in-chiefs, i hope that you find this publication’s work as fulfilling as i have. to our readers, our submitters, and all of our supporters not mentioned here, we wish you all the best and eagerly await your thoughts on our issue. keep safe, stay in touch, and happy reading! sincerely, noah valdez, editor-in-chief 26 δι αν οι α the epistemic injustice of ex contradictione quodlibet sherry tseng the principle of ex contradictione quodlibete stipulates that from contradiction, all propositions follow. from this, all explode into triviality; hence, the aversion towards contradiction. however, our social selves are mired with inconsistency and contradictions and identities built on a spectrum. the assumption of triviality from contradiction in formal logic makes it such that the contradictions found within natural language on our social identities equally trivializes those contradictory aspects, and thereby, inflicts an epistemic injustice. i argue that if natural language is to be formalized, then there exists a moral imperative to defer to paraconsistent logic, specifically in cases of linguistic inconsistency relevant to aspects of social identity. the conditionality of the claim proves important: i do not defend the assertion that natural language can be formalized—that is a philosophical and technical anthology in its own right. rather, i would like to undertake the normative project of highlighting what i take to be a necessary condition for the formalization of natural language. the argument is as follows: the rejection of inconsistency denies the expression of social experiences lying outside the binary. it presupposes a singularity of social experience, and in assuming this, inflicts epistemic injustice. to a further extent, this jeopardizes social justice and political freedom via its hindrance to the dialogical basis of democracy. in its acceptance of inconsistency without triviality, we ought to accept paraconsistent logic, understood under a larger framework of logical pluralism, as a strong antidote to the harms outlined above. 27issue vii ◆ spring 2020 ex contradictione quodlibet the urgency of this demand emerges from the significant overlap between formal and boolean logic with the implications of the former largely carrying over to the latter. the premises of big data and artificial intelligence, grounded in boolean logic, have their linguistics subsumed under natural language processing (and thereby formal logic). this trend persists even as developments in the field have shifted from rule-based algorithms to statistical models and vector representations. through its adoption of formal logic’s views on inconsistency, the future of technology has then rendered itself vulnerable to these aforementioned harms, and by way of algorithmic learning, will only experience its problems perpetuated and compounded further. the essay begins in §i with an introduction of epistemic injustice and its associated harms, of which i specifically focus on illocutionary silencing. with these conceptual resources, §ii demonstrates how the assumption of triviality as a consequence of contradiction inflicts epistemic injustice in the form of illocutionary silencing. §iii continues by offering a positive solution in the form of paraconsistent logic, and though accounts of this form of logic are wildly disparate—tied only by the common thread of non-explosion—i believe that this one thread is a moral commitment necessary to make. §i epistemic injustice introduced by miranda fricker (2007), epistemic injustice is an injustice arising from dissimilarities in individual and collective epistemic resources. fricker then proceeds to divide this into two camps: testimonial and hermeneutical injustice. 1. testimonial injustice: “wherein a speaker receives an unfair deficit or credibility from a hearer owing to prejudice on the hearer’s part.” (fricker 2007, 9) patricia williams, a professor at columbia university law school, demonstrates a paradigmatic case of this in her book the alchemy of right and race, wherein she recounts a personal, anti-black, racist experience. yet, upon retelling this event, she would often disbelieve herself—a consequence perhaps in no small part attributable to the prejudicial stereotypes of african americans as “liars” or “paranoid,” consequently leading fricker to discern that she has suffered an instance of testimonial injustice. 2. hermeneutical injustice: “wherein someone has a significant area of their social experience obscured from understanding owing to prejudicial flaws in shared resources for social interpretation.” (fricker 2007, 148) sexual harassment is a common example of this second form of epistemic injustice. prior to its conceptualization, many of those victimized lacked the epistemic resources 28 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college to articulate their experiences, which were then previously rendered unintelligible. instead, their discomfort would be ‘interpreted’ as overly prudish or lacking in sense of humor, henceforth exemplifying a hermeneutical injustice. of note here is the distinction between hermeneutical and testimonial injustice in the collectivity of epistemology. in the hermeneutical form, the injustice arises from a deficit in the shared pool of knowledge, whereas in testimonial form, the injustice may be rooted in a singular repository of it. in the example given for the hermeneutical, society lacks the conceptual resource of sexual harassment itself—an absence that points to a structural and collective inequity in epistemology. conversely, in the case of testimonial injustice, williams’s example does not causally trace (at least necessarily) to a flaw in a shared resource, but instead, may be attributable to one individual’s racist beliefs and attitudes. and still, the two forms are nonetheless deeply intertwined: the hermeneutical may lead to the testimonial and the testimonial may be a manifestation of the hermeneutical. what follows from these injustices are harms of both an epistemic and pragmatic nature. the excerpt below focuses on one harm of illocutionary silencing, as proffered by rae langston: “if you are powerful, you sometimes have the ability to silence the speech of the powerless. one way might be to stop the powerless from speaking at all. gag them, threaten them, condemn them to solitary confinement. but there is another, less dramatic but equally effective way. let them speak. let them say whatever they like to whomever they like, but stop that speech from counting as an action…” (langton 1993, 299) illocutionary silencing is the refusal to admit a proposition’s illocutionary force, or that which is constituted by the words themselves.1 it nullifies the performative force of the words, disallowing the utterances from passing on their intended meaning, thus following from epistemic injustice’s emerging inequities. in the case of williams, her attempt to describe this racist encounter was negated—her words stripped of their force in invoking a case of discrimination. similarly, the inability to articulate a grammar for sexual harassment may count as a form of silencing insofar its conceptual deficit precludes the description of the experience. furthermore, the reactions to circumlocutionary attempts to do so effectively impedes the victims’ ability to promulgate those experiences, and resultingly, commits the injustice (whether testimonial or hermeneutical) all the same. to conclude, epistemic injustice is the sort of injustice that emerges from differences in epistemic stature. for the remainder of this paper, i use this as the pedagogical framework to make sense of the injustice enacted by classical formal logic and its insistence on consistency. 1 for more on this, see austin’s how to do things with words (1962) 29issue vii ◆ spring 2020 ex contradictione quodlibet §ii ex contradictione quodlibet’s epistemic injustice in a keynote lecture delivered at the 8th annual philadelphia trans-health conference in 2009, writer and trans-bi activist julia serano stated, “[t]here is simply no more effective way of hurting me than trans-invalidating me.” in what follows, i argue that the consequence of triviality from contradiction clears the path to such harms of invalidation through its enactment of epistemic injustice. but first, a brief note on the specifics of ex contradictione quodlibet. while the path from contradiction to triviality may differ, one such form famously derived by david lewis takes the following structure: “suppose p and not-p then p by simplification, whence p or q by addition, not-p by simplification again, and finally q by disjunctive syllogism.” according to this argument, any statement q follows from the premise of p and not p. some may object to this proof in that entailment needs to do more work than simply truth-preservation: it also needs to retain some meaningful connection or relevance between the two propositional statements. regardless of how one argues ex contradictione quodlibet, the central point remains: contradiction explodes into triviality. it is important to take note of what the definition and consequences of what it means to be trivial, the first of which being that triviality could be taken as entailing everything. this, however, draws from the principle of ex contradiction quodlibet, proving to be circular reasoning at best, and because of this, cannot be taken freely as the definition. second, triviality is that which is uninteresting or insignificant. essential to this definition is the assumed goal of logic and epistemology to uncover truths, or, at the very least, proximate truths about the world. there are certain propositions more interesting than others and the rejection of contradiction from ex contradictione quodlibet implies the undesirability of triviality. for the remainder of this paper, i adopt this latter definition. 30 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college having adopted this understanding of triviality as ‘that which is uninteresting or insignificant,’ it is now possible to move on to the discussion of inconsistency’s intertwinement with epistemic injustice—beginning with an example of gender queerness. consider the following statement: (a) i am a girl. (b) i am not a girl. let’s say that alex utters these two statements in response to a question asking them to identify their gender. alex identifies as genderqueer.2 to them, both (a) and (b) are true.3 given how they identify, alex is both a girl and not a girl. by formal logic’s adoption of ex contradictione quodlibet, however, alex’s utterances make it such that each and every statement can follow. they are all trivial, and thus, devoid of importance. from this, epistemic injustice then enters into the picture. with their speech now made trivial, alex’s credibility as a knower and their ability to make significant contributions to the conversation on genderqueerness is cast out, thereby constituting a case of testimonial injustice. it is also arguable that alex also experiences hermeneutical injustice since the mutually exclusive gender binary does not provide the conceptual resource to capture alex’s experience of gender, and on this count, their social experiences are effectively obscured. the path to illocutionary silencing is not far off. in this case, alex’s illocutionary act is the very proclamation of their gender identity as a girl and not a girl. in keeping with ex contradictione quodlibet and its aversion towards triviality, only one of these two statements can be true, which of course has the negative consequence of disallowing their entire illocutionary force. by having their proclamation fall upon deaf ears, alex experiences both testimonial and hermeneutical injustice, and thus, becomes silenced. despite however much the act of silencing in itself is negative, the scope of these harms extends even further with repercussions for both social justice and political freedom. concerning social justice, when one silences the speech of the powerless, they favor a specific form of discourse—that of the powerful. this perpetuates the further marginalization of the powerless through the determination of what sort of gender proves significant, which nullifies alex’s own words as unimportant given their contradiction. on this account, epistemic injustice is a manifestation 2 this is understood in the sense that their gender identities are maintained by some combination of masculinity and femininity, or neither. 3 for the remainder of this paper, i will assume alex identifies themselves using the pronouns “they/them/theirs.” it may change, of course, and this is by no means an assumption that all genderqueer people need use such pronouns. 31issue vii ◆ spring 2020 ex contradictione quodlibet of social injustice stemming from the rendering of the powerless as the speechless. furthermore, taken as a collective, the experiences of all those who identify as genderqueer are similarly silenced, paving the way for injustice to affect an entire social class of people like alex. concerning political freedom, fricker makes this a point in referencing phillip petit’s contestability criterion. he states that a functioning deliberative democracy needs to meet the three conditions for contestation, which include: a “potential basis for contestation,” a “channel or void available by which decisions may be contested,” and a “suitable forum in existence for hearing contestations.”4 being illocutionary silenced, however, disables speakers from contestation. because alex’s identity was not taken as it was intended in meaning, the immediate jump to the consequence of triviality as stipulated by ex contradictione quodlibet strips alex of their ability to contest this conclusion. from this, they are excluded from securing a certain threshold of political freedom, which petit stipulates as necessary for a deliberative democracy. what does this mean for technology? returning to my original motivation, the basis of this paper resides in the substantial overlap between formal logic and the logic underlying computer science and artificial intelligence. it is this overlap and the permeation of technology into nearly every crevice of our lives that lends an urgency to my demand to attempt a rectification, or at the very least, acknowledgment of the inflicted epistemic injustice of ex contradictione quodlibet. in particular, by accepting formal logic as prior to other epistemic sources, as technology so often does, its stance on contradiction—that triviality necessarily follows—then holds the power to dictate our understanding of the world. by taking the principle as an authority on truth, the ontological may end up following the logical. our social constructions of the world would be determined by a framework strictly adhering to a dichotomous binary, such that it creates a world where genderqueerness would not exist a priori. in taking into account how the field makes sense of this, it is important to note that recent developments in the field have increasingly shifted from rule-based algorithms to statistical models; in particular, vector semantics have exploded in popularity in building computational models of language.5 this largely consists in word association: for example, the definition of the word “bank” is determined depending upon whether the sentence contains words alluding to the likes of “money” or “river.” following this, that the bulk of the two formalized propositions of (a) and (b) are 4 pettit, 186-187. 5 for a brief overview on how vector semantics works, see the following: https://medium.com/@ram.analytics1/anintroductory-notes-on-vector-semantics-tf-idf-model-and-a-toy-implementation-9046198bf7d and https://web. stanford.edu/~jurafsky/li15/lec3.vector.pdf 32 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college identical indicates that they are on the same broad topic of someone being something. much like the case with many other prepositions and conjunctions, the “not” is not always captured in building the meaning of the proposition.6 while negation systems have not become all-around powerful enough to build the meaning of the proposition on their own, the scope of this paper applies to cases on the margins of error where the negation of “not” is able to be captured (the choice of which made on account of the fact that the field is headed in that direction). yet, as i have argued, accommodation of negation in a formal setting leads to instances of epistemic injustice. §iii the solution: paraconsistent logic to the above, i believe that paraconsistent logic is a strong contestant as a positive solution to the formal infliction of epistemic injustice, its defining characteristic being its rejection of ex contradictione quodlibet. since its inception, a number of influential strands have emerged. for example, among the first was stanislaw jaśkowski’s discussive logic, where truthfulness is determined by the totality of assertions posited by a single subject. graham priest’s “logic of paradox” introduced a three-valued logic, the third being both true and false, and newton da costa presented logics of formal inconsistency (isolating the instances of inconsistency), which has since been expanded upon by many others, such as walter carnielli and marcelo coniglio. for the remainder of this section, despite citing several of these logics as solutions to the problems of epistemic injustice, i would like to remain indifferent on which of these specifically proves most favorable. to reiterate, the problem with ex contradictione quodlibet is that it assumes alex’s utterances, technically contradictions in formal logic, do not matter. priest, however, maintained that inconsistent theories did not necessarily lead to triviality, citing bohr’s theory of the atom. alex’s utterances of (a) and (b) are not inconsistent, but from the standpoint of the listener, it would absurd to argue that this then makes their statements insignificant—if anything, it is the conjunction of the two that makes their speech especially relevant. one might object here, pointing to the goal of logic to approximate the truth. what i have presented may appear as circular in that alex’s gender identification indicates a non-trivial, but inconsistent theory. yet, the existence of a non-trivial, but inconsistent theory is also what allows alex to identify the way that they do. to this, 6 for applied progress in the field, see: mehrabi, saeed et al. “deepen: a negation detection system for clinical text incorporating dependency relation into negex,” journal of biomedical informatics 54 (2015): 213-219 and wu, stephen et al. “negation’s not solved: generalizability versus optimizability in clinical natuarl language processing,” plos one (2014), accessed from https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal. pone.0112774 33issue vii ◆ spring 2020 ex contradictione quodlibet i take on the assumption that gender identity is something that is self-promulgated rather than externally imposed, well within the right of an individual to proclaim as theirs as it fosters a knowing self-consciousness capable of validating their own experience.7 counter to classical first-order logic, paraconsistent logic can accommodate the contradiction to uphold the significance of alex’s words. for example, the manyvalued logics priest proposed gives space to inconsistent and non-trivial theories. the truth-value of “both true and false” creates a third dimension of truth-evaluation that keeps the relation from exploding into triviality. the consequences of this for alex are substantial: by not having their words trivialized, their words are therefore legitimized. the admission of inconsistency erases the inherent bias within the traditionally binary logical system that obscures their social experience. this, in turn, deflects the harms of illocutionary silencing and the formal inflictions of testimonial and hermeneutical injustice. still, one might consider another potential interpretation of the apparent paradox posed by alex’s utterances of (a) and (b)—namely, what if this is just a matter of language? the epistemic injustice would not be located in the words themselves, but in linguistic conflation. in the case of alex, one might argue that their utterances of (a) and (b) reflect a variation in the sense of the term “girl” itself, with one being biological and the other social. while this may be so, the concern assumes a direct causality where thought is prior to language, and hence, the knowledge of two distinguishable senses proves sufficient enough to cast aside this juxtaposition, this, however much it would reconcile the problem, cannot be freely granted. work in philosophy, linguistics and psychology demonstrates the profound influence of language on thought, whereby some like donald davidson, for example, claimed that belief states emerged from public linguistic interaction such that thought and language work in tandem. psychologist lera boroditsky argues further that grammatical gender strongly sways the descriptive attributes of an object,8 which when taken with davidson’s thesis, strongly suggests that linguistic resources may affect our cognitive understandings. the same can be said of formal resources: as mentioned earlier, the priority of formal logic may lead to an embedding of the binary into our cognitive framework. in fact, the linguistic aspect might compound the problem of epistemic injustice in formalized language, not even admitting a difference in the biological and the social senses. by way of the formal properties of the term “girl,” the biological sense 7 this derives from strands of the kantian tradition emphasizing self-knowledge and self-conception. 8 see: boroditsky, lera, “how does our language shape the way we think?” accessed from https://www.edge.org/ conversation/how-does-our-language-shape-the-way-we-think 34 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college is inherently conflated with the social, which may result in further iterations of the harm (if not also a further narrowing of the hermeneutical resources). to this, paraconsistent logic may again play the role of a remedy. admission of (a) and (b) as contradictory, but non-trivial, allows for both the biological and social senses to hold true. the use of adaptive logics, for example, which offers severance to contact, accounts for internal inconsistency within a single subject. by adapting to different situations, the word “girl” takes on different meanings according to contextual clues and background knowledge, such as alex’s intentions and the very idea of gender queerness. by this, it allows for both senses to be true, but also admits the term in the same sense with respect to the context of an expanded knowledge of genderqueerness. i have made the claim that paraconsistent logic offers a fruitful response to the challenges posed to formal logic by inconsistent, but non-trivial theories and linguistics. but it is possible to take the argument even further: not only does paraconsistent logic do such work, but it also proves necessary in order to properly convey meaning in formalized language. all of this is to say that the logic itself must not dictate meaning, but rather that, meaning must lead to its formalization. the fact that inconsistency permeates our world must be reflected in formalized language. applications of paraconsistent logic are growing in data and knowledge bases (grant 2000), isolating inconsistent material so as to simultaneously admit the two nodes of inconsistency. however, interest in such must be acted upon for the purpose of retaining meaning and preventing epistemic injustice. one last point to be made on my argument: formal logic as it applies to natural language fails normatively, but not necessarily, formally. from the standpoint of logical argumentation, classical first-order logic does indeed succeed. furthermore, it must also be noted that it does not inflict epistemic injustice in all cases: when i utter (a) and (b), one is necessarily true and the other necessarily false on the basis of how i identify my gender identity. classical formal logic succeeds in my case. however, its failure to represent alex’s social experience according to that by which they identity indicates that we ought not to take it as an omniscient authority over truth. the argument i have set forth here is not meant to discredit the standing of formal logic in its entirety, but rather, to elucidate its futility under certain contexts. the claim is meant to provide a normative approach to opening the door to logical pluralism. first-order logic need not be discredited in its totality, but its scope should be limited in its application and its position ceded to other logical systems (viz. as paraconsistent logic). 35issue vii ◆ spring 2020 ex contradictione quodlibet concluding remarks in this essay, i have shown that paraconsistent logic serves as a positive solution to the epistemic injustice and associated harms inflicted by classical formal logic in its insistence on ex contradictione quodlibet. in particular, because formal logic stipulates a mutually exclusive true-false dichotomy, application of it effectively invalidates speech and information. in cases of genderqueerness, this leads to serious threats in our abilities as epistemic agents as well as in the broader picture of social justice and political freedom. that paraconsistent logic may be a promising logic proves so on account of its acceptance of inconsistency without the consequence of triviality, and its ability to represent the actual character of propositional meaning in a formalized language. as the future of ai is intrinsically bound to formal logic, the consequences of epistemic injustice will only become more evident and tangible lest we adopt some form of paraconsistent logic and adhere to logical pluralism. accordingly, our fundamental view of formal logic must be tweaked and reevaluated in light of the normative and moral concerns presented previously. ◆ bibliography austin, john l. how to do things with words, oxford: oxford university press, 1962. dotson, kristie, “tracking epistemic violence, tracking practices of silencing,” hypatia 26, no. 2 (2011): 236-257. fricker, miranda, epistemic injustice: power and the ethics of knowing, oxford: oxford university press, 2007. -“epistemic justice as a condition of political freedom?” synthese 190, no. 7 (2013): 1317-1332. hornsby, jennifer and langton, rae, “free speech and illocution,” legal theory 4 (1998): 21-37. langton, rae, “speech acts and unspeakable acts,” philosophy and public affairs 4, no. 22 (1993): 293-330. mizraji, educardo, “vector logic: a natural algebraic representation of the fundamental logical gates,” journal of logic and computation 18, no. 1 (2008): 97-121. norvig, peter and russell, stuart j., artificial intelligence: a modern approach, upper saddle river: pearson inc., 2009. 46 δι αν οι α human (and) nature: using arendt to reconcile models of environmental ethics caroline gillette introduction in the human condition, hannah arendt implicitly oscillates between two paradigms that relate the human to nature. though she neither acknowledges the presence of multiple paradigms nor their apparent contradiction, she alternatively depicts man as part of, and separate from, nature. while these two depictions seem necessarily to conflict, arendt finds both equally viable and essential to her project. this paper attempts to use the coexistence of these two man-nature paradigms in the human condition as a model to reconcile a similar tension between two useful—but equally contradictory—man-nature paradigms in christian environmental ethics. background many scholars of environmental philosophy have previously written on the unique manner in which arendt understands the relationship between man and nature. paul ott holds that arendt subscribes to a nature-culture dualism, which, he argues, allows humans to honestly acknowledge the inherent opposition between man and nature and to begin to seek a balance between the two (though this author argues that he underestimates the moments of nature-culture monism in arendt’s work).1 anne chapman takes arendt’s earth-world and natural-human dichotomies at face 1 paul ott, "world and earth: hannah arendt and the human relationship to nature," ethics, place & environment 12.1 (2009): 1-16. 47issue vii ◆ spring 2020 human (and) nature value and derives an ethics of environmentalism from them.2 peter cannavò, noting moments where arendt imbues nature with dignity and meaning, extends her wish for the durability of different environments to include the most natural aspects of the human artifice.3 maurizio passerin d'entrèves identifies similar tension between the role of nature in arendt's critiques of modernity, though he does not extend the tension to her conception of humans in general.4 yet, despite all of these examples and the knowledge of this author, arendt has never been used specifically to analyze theological models of environmental protection. arendt’s nature-man paradigm in one paradigm in the human condition, arendt portrays man as inherently part of nature. she calls the earth “the very quintessence of the human condition” and men “the children of nature.”5 the status of man as natural is neither an unhappy accident nor something to overcome, since arendt bemoans the idea of humans forgetting or leaving nature all together. her anxiety over modern man’s growing alienation from nature frames the book, which in turn, also frames this essay insofar as it uses her understanding of man’s relationship with nature as the natural man paradigm. while adhering to the natural man paradigm, arendt cites several ways in which modern man has erroneously convinced himself that he is a distinct and separate entity from nature. for instance, with the development of more abstract fields of mathematics, man prefers to think of natural concepts in the theoretical plane—as if they are something man can only grasp with his mind. as a result, man sees the earth as a third party observer, “from a universal, astrophysical viewpoint, a cosmic standpoint outside nature itself.”6 he believes he holds the same relationship to the earth as anything else in the cosmos, never acknowledging the special relationship that he possesses with it as a species—amongst many—that depends on the earth for its existence. she has similar concerns about the development of modern science, of which “earth alienation became and has remained [its] hallmark” as it became more mathematically-based.7 she worries that “the modern reductio scientiae ad mathematicam has overruled the testimony of nature as witnessed at close range by human senses.”8 that is, science has the same problem as math: it ceased to be a tool to understand what we learn about nature sensually, and has instead become more authoritative about reality than actual nature. not only does arendt reject this 2 anne chapman, "the ways that nature matters: the world and the earth in the thought of hannah arendt," environmental values 16, no. 4 (2007): 433-445. 3 peter f. cannavò, “hannah arendt: place, world, and earthly nature,” in engaging nature: environmentalism and the political theory canon, ed. peter f. cannavò, (cambridge: mit, 2014), 253-269. 4 maurizio passerin d'entrèves, the political philosophy of hannah arendt, london; new york: routledge,1994. 5 hannah arendt, the human condition (chicago: university of chicago, 2018), 2. 6 arendt, the human condition, 265, emphasis mine. 7 ibid, pg. 264. 8 ibid, pg. 267. 48 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college view since man can “observ[e] natural phenomena as they were given to him,”9 but she also concludes that man sees nature firsthand through his senses because he is inextricably in and of it. the legacy of the age of exploration merely compounded these effects further, since mapping the earth made it seem smaller—literally removed man from it—since much of cartography’s poetic propriety takes place in the air. “the fact that the decisive shrinkage of the earth was the consequence of the invention of the airplane, that is, of leaving the surface of the earth altogether, is like a symbol for the general phenomenon that any decrease of terrestrial distance can be won only at the price of putting a decisive distance between man and earth, of alienating man from his immediate earthly surroundings.”10 by mapping the corners of the globe, man set up a dichotomous relationship wherein he was the actor and the earth the acted-upon. moreover, once he finished, rather than realizing how dwarfed he was by its stature, the earth instead became small to him since by man’s own hand he could now see the whole structure at once. it no longer seemed like all-encompassing environment; thereby, leading humans to once again think of the earth from a third-person perspective. arendt cites a few examples to demonstrate that this earthly alienation has generally saturated modern humans’—not just scientists’ and explorers’—view of their nature, referring to two particular ways in which these “earth-bound creatures … have begun to act as though [they] were dwellers of the universe.”11 first, one can see the results of man no longer believing he is of the earth through what he says about space travel. humans reacted to the successful launch of sputnik as if it were the first step toward a jailbreak, referring to their continued existence on the earth as “imprisonment.”12 the sentiment that mankind is somehow temporarily “bound to the earth” until it can happily free itself reveals man’s entirely new understanding of his place in the universe.13 the second piece of evidence that arendt cites alludes to man’s desire to make humans ‘not of nature’ in the literal sense, referring to the role of bioengineering in order to create life through eugenics, in vitro fertilization and gene editing. man would not want to do this if he did not already believe that he was not of nature; he is simply making it literal. she specifically states that the “desire to escape from imprisonment to the earth” shares a motivation with the desire to mix ‘frozen germ plasm from people of demonstrated ability under the microscope to produce superior 9 ibid, pg. 265. 10 ibid, pg. 251. 11 arendt, the human condition, 3. 12 ibid, pg. 1. 13 ibid, pg. 2. 49issue vii ◆ spring 2020 human (and) nature human beings,’ and ‘to alter [their] size shape and function.’”14 yet, it is important to take note that arendt objects to any form of man playing god when it comes to the process of humans ‘entering the world’ because she believes it essential that man remain a part of nature. arendt’s reason for periodically championing an understanding of man as a part of nature and at other times lamenting his loss of that understanding—remains in her view of humankind—as ultimately inseparable from the earth. she writes that, “earthly nature, for all we know, may be unique in the universe in providing human beings with a habitat in which they can move and breathe without effort and without artifice.”15 despite what they might believe, humans are not dwellers of the universe, and the fact remains that they need the earth to survive. it is not clear whether maintaining earthly nature would remain important if, for example, another planet was found with an environment similar to earth’s, but as for now, this planet remains irreplaceable. the oppositional man paradigm and yet, the idea that the earth’s environment is irreplaceable appears to be contradicted elsewhere in the text. in another passage, arendt states that artificial environments are just as good, if not better. when discussing the creation of the artificial human realm, she says: “in addition to the conditions under which life is given to man on earth, and partly out of them, men constantly create their own, self-made conditions, which, their human origin and their variability notwithstanding, possess the same conditioning power as natural things”16 if that is the case, it begs the question of what would be the problem with living in an entirely artificial environment? if humans could survive in a biodome on another planet, it would not just have the capacity to shape the human condition, it would have the exact same conditioning power as the earth does now. man, then, should be able to exist independently of nature and should be understood as such. in fact, there are many passages in the human condition that imply a man-nature dichotomy. in this second arendtian paradigm, man is inherently separate from, in opposition with—and most importantly—dominant over nature. the problem with modernity in this paradigm is not that humans are too artificial, but that they are too natural. especially in arendt’s labor-work-action model, the very definition of ‘human’ depends upon distinguishing it from ‘natural.’ the remainder of this essay 14 ibid. 15 ibid. 16 arendt, the human condition, 9, emphasis mine. 50 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college will refer to this understanding of man’s relationship with nature as the oppositional man paradigm. while subscribing to the oppositional man paradigm, a ‘natural man’ becomes a contradiction in terms throughout her discussion of labor since arendt defines it as the “the most natural and least worldly17 of man’s activities” because it does not lastingly convert nature into anything.18 its products are consumed and disposed of, but nature’s metabolic process remains unaltered. meanwhile, a person primarily occupied with labor she terms an animal laborans, which means “only one, at best the highest, of the animal species which populate the earth.”19 putting these facts together, if one is primarily engaged in a natural activity as opposed to worldly activities, one does not even fit the definition of human—one is an animal. humans, by contrast, are engaged in work and action, both of which imply some degree of artificiality. work “provides an ‘artificial’ world of things, distinctly different from all-natural surroundings,”20 as it is the process of converting nature into something durably useful to humans. it is particularly concerned with creating the public realm, which arendt specifically says “is not identical with the earth or with nature.”21 it is only in the public realm—not in nature—that action can take place, and only outside nature, then, that man can exist qua man since a life without speech or action “has ceased to be a human life.”22 bearing this in mind, the ‘human’ cannot be fully defined with reference only to nature as there must be some reference to the artificial in order to fill out properly the requirements. in a mock venn diagram, the circle labeled ‘humans’ is not contained within the circle labeled ‘nature’ as would be the case in the natural man paradigm. moreover, the language arendt uses to depict the relationship between man and nature at times implies not just separation, but also open antagonism. arendt describes the process of converting nature into something artificial as always having an element of “violation and violence.”23 homo faber, a human employed with work or action,24 apparently does not just act in a realm separate from nature, but “conducts himself as lord and master of the whole earth,” unlike the not-fully-human animal laborans who is a servant to it.25 moreover, homo faber “has always been a destroyer of nature,”26 since to be fully human, man cannot simply be in charge of nature—which he could do as part of nature—he must ‘attack’ it. but nature does not remain passive 17 note that ‘worldly’ to arendt, is the opposite of ‘earthly,’ parallel to the dichotomy of ‘artificial’ and ‘natural.’ it generally means ‘pertaining to the human artifice created by work. 18 ibid, pg. 101. 19 ibid, pg. 84. 20 arendt, the human condition, 7. 21 ibid, pg. 52. 22 ibid, pg. 176. 23 ibid, pg. 139. 24 ibid, pg. 136. 25 ibid, pg. 139. 26 ibid. 51issue vii ◆ spring 2020 human (and) nature in the face of this ‘attack,’ for it “forever invades the human artifice, threatening the durability of the world and its fitness for human use.”27 rather than simply relieve humans of the above-described problems modernity poses in the natural man paradigm, while adhering to the oppositional man paradigm, arendt identifies a completely different problem with the modern period. seemingly contradicting her initial concerns with modern science and its ilk, in the oppositional man paradigm modern humans have almost become too natural. they are not distinct enough from nature since everyone is an animal laborans who “acquiesce[s] in a dazed, ‘tranquilized,’ functional type of behavior.”28 these jobholders do not ‘act’ in the arendtian sense, and they—like animals—do not use action to distinguish themselves from each other, but rather, to “abandon [their] individuality.”29 modern human society, then, is a society of animals based upon this framework. the stewardship model and oppositional man the above-described contradictions between the two modes of thought contained in the human condition mirror the conflict between two theological models of ecological responsibility vying for dominance. it might seem inappropriate to draw from arendt to attempt to solve a theological debate, yet the human condition does not reject theism, but only insists that it address questions whose answers would not be affected by the existence of a god. arendt distinguishes between ‘the human condition’ and ‘human nature’ as the latter would presuppose a human purpose, and therefore, a creator. she only makes claims about the former, which concerns the condition in which humans happen to find themselves, given that they do exist.30 nonetheless, while the discussion that follows concerns models that are theologically derived, the academic debate over them concerns which one is the more practically effective in addressing the ongoing ecological crisis (the theological justification of each is not typically challenged). taking aside the question of whether each model is valid from a theological standpoint and considering only their relative efficacies, arendt’s work is as appropriate as anyone else’s in considering what to do with these two seemingly contradictory positions. the first and more traditional theological model is less antagonistic than arendt’s oppositional man paradigm, but shares with it a view of man as a third-party dominant over nature. based in the book of genesis, the stewardship model holds that humans should protect nature because it was given as a service to them by god. it is in their best interest for nature to thrive, and as a check to humanity’s shortsightedness, the model holds that humans have dominion over nature but not over god since their wills are subordinate to his for the earth. 27 ibid, pg. 100. 28 arendt, the human condition, 322. 29 ibid. 30 ibid, pg. 10-11. 52 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college pope john paul ii articulates the stewardship model best, as it pertains to environmental protection, in the papal encyclical sollicitudo rei socialis. he affirms man’s reign over nature, claiming that man is “superior to the other creatures placed by god under his dominion,” but reminds his church that “man must remain subject to the will of god.”31 that is, having dominion over the earth does not mean that humans can do whatever they please. they must consider the divine will, which, presumably, desires the preservation of nature so that it may continue to benefit the future generations to come. accordingly, “development cannot consist only in the use, dominion over and indiscriminate possession of created things and the products of human industry” but rather man must remember that he is created in god’s likeness.32 he must have the same concern for what is in his dominion as god has for what is in god’s— humankind. many have criticized this model because the human obligation to protect the environment is derived from humankind’s role as nature’s divinely appointed (yet anthropocentric and paternalistic) caretakers, but not due to any special dignity that nature has in and of itself.33 even if humans were the perfect stewards—and they certainly are not—some argue that viewing nature as subordinate to and in service of humanity inevitably leads humans to exploit it.34 there is no obligation in this model to protect nature in ways that are not eventually useful to man, because nature’s value is a consequence of its service to man, leading many environmentalists to prefer a model that views nature as valuable in its own right. companionship model and natural man another theological model that satisfies this desire—the companionship model— echoes arendt’s natural man paradigm in that it takes man as existing within nature as one part of it. pope francis can be understood to be speaking from this viewpoint in the encyclical laudato si’, wherein he criticizes human development of technology “according to an undifferentiated and one-dimensional paradigm.”35 he states that, “this paradigm exalts the concept of a subject who, using logical and rational procedures, progressively approaches and gains control over an external object. this subject makes every effort to establish the scientific and experimental method, which in itself is already a technique of possession, mastery and transformation.”36 31 john paul ii, encyclical on the social concern sollicitudo rei socialis (30 dec. 1987) §29, at the holy see, http://www.vatican.va/content/john-paul-ii/en/encyclicals/documents/hf_jp-ii_enc_30121987_ 32 sollicitudo rei socialis, §29 33 robin attfield, “environmental sensitivity and critiques of stewardship,” in environmental stewardship: critical perspectives, past and present, ed. berry, r. j. (london: t&t clark, 2006). 76. 34 michael j. himes and kenneth r. himes, fullness of faith: the public significance of theology (new york: paulist press, 1993). 107. 35 francis i, encyclical on care for our common home laudato si’ (24 may 2015) §106, at the holy see, http:// w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/encyclicals/documents/papa-francesco_20150524_enciclica-laudato-si.ht 36 laudato si’, §106. 53issue vii ◆ spring 2020 human (and) nature this argument is strikingly similar to arendt’s. pope francis also worries that modern science makes one falsely believe that nature is something one can grasp and act upon as a third party, expressing concern at believing “empirical science provides a complete explanation of life, the interplay of all creatures and the whole of reality,” rather than bypassing nature in its quest for the truth about reality.37 he would have mankind remember that it exists within nature. michael and kenneth himes articulate their version of this model—which they call a companionship model—in their book fullness of faith. they also reference genesis as their biblical source but point instead to the creation of eve as evidence that man was created to exist in relationality to nature; that is to say, not in complete isolation. seeing as how god loves all of creation, it is not just other humans that are worthy of being related to; nature is an end in and of itself that is loved by god. therefore, humans should not consider nature as an ‘it’ to be acted upon, but rather, they should consider themselves as a part of nature and in mutual companionship with all of its creatures.38 humans should protect the environment not out of self-interest, but out of love for creatures as ends within themselves. though this model avoids depicting nature as a tool, the problem with this model is its practicality as universal empathy is difficult for most people to conceptualize and consequently to actualize. the stewardship model has problems, but self-interest remains far more efficient. the environmental crisis will have disastrous, lasting effects if drastic policy changes are not made in the coming months and years, and now there is not enough time to rely solely on the hope that humans will realize and become committed to all beings in nature. building a syncretic model and conclusion fortunately, using the human condition as a model, one can hold these two paradigms simultaneously, without interpreting one as rendering the other invalid when they contradict. arendt neither acknowledges the apparent tension between her two models, nor does she dwell at length on how they coexist. the best textual resource available for parsing out the relationship between the two paradigms, however, can be found in the prologue when arendt states that, “[t]he human artifice of the world separates human existence from all mere animal environment, but life itself is outside this artificial world, and through life man remains related to all other living organisms.”39 that is, arendt does not take the human as one self-contained concept that must fit into a single relational structure with nature. this possibility becomes more vivid when one considers that homo faber, at times, labors. although animal laborans is not human because of his natural activity, his lack 37 laudato si’, §199. 38 himes and himes, fullness of faith, 109-110. 39 arendt, the human condition, 2, emphasis mine. 54 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college of humanity remains so because he is primarily engaged in labor—not that he labors at all. as such, homo faber does not cease to be fully human when he stops acting for a moment to eat a meal—he is alive, he sleeps and he does many natural things, but he is still homo faber and is still fully human. accordingly, man straddles the natural and artificial—he is of nature in some aspects, but separate from it in others. we can simultaneously know by virtue of the fact that we are alive, that we are of nature, and that we have the capacity to create and to act in the world that we are not natural. similarly, using tools provided by arendt, one does not have to choose between the stewardship and companionship models of justification for preserving the environment, but rather, one can understand the relationship between man and nature to be twofold or piecemeal. man can exist in relationality to, and be of, nature while still being its steward. in believing both to be true, man is forced to find a balance between self-interest and empathy, wherein the drawbacks of each model are balanced out by the presence of the other. more can be done quickly in the realm of environmental protection if humans can be motivated simultaneously by a belief that a healthy environment is beneficial to them and by another belief that all the creatures within nature are humanity’s companions. ◆ 55issue vii ◆ spring 2020 human (and) nature bibliography arendt, hannah. the human condition. chicago: university of chicago press, 2018. attfield, robin. “environmental sensitivity and critiques of stewardship.” in environmental stewardship: critical perspectives, past and present, edited by r.j. berry, 76-91. london: t&t clark, 2006. cannavò, peter f. "hannah arendt: place, world, and earthly nature." in engaging nature: environmentalism and the political theory canon, edited by peter f. cannavò, 253-269. cambridge: mit, 2015. chapman, anne. “the ways that nature matters: the world and the earth in the thought of hannah arendt.” environmental values, vol. 16, no. 4, (2007): 433–445. jstor, www.jstor.org/stable/30302380. francis i. encyclical on care for our common home laudato si’ (24 may 2015) at the holy see, http://w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/encyclicals/documents/ papa-francesco_20150524_enciclica-laudato-si.html himes, michael j., and kenneth r. himes. fullness of faith: the public significance of theology. new york: paulist press, 1993. john paul ii. encyclical on the social concern sollicitudo rei socialis (30 dec. 1987) at the holy see, http://www.vatican.va/content/johnpaulii/en/encyclicals/ documents/hf_jpii_enc_30121987_sollicitudo-rei-socialis.html maurizio passerin d'entrèves, the political philosophy of hannah arendt, london; new york: routledge,1994. ott, paul. "world and earth: hannah arendt and the human relationship to nature." ethics, place & environment 12.1 (2009): 1-16. passerin d'entrèves, maurizio. the political philosophy of hannah arendt. london ; new york: routledge,1994. 8 δι αν οι α merleau-ponty and barthes on image consciousness: probing the (im)possibility of meaning natasha beaudin pearson for both maurice merleau-ponty and roland barthes, images are not merely objects in space; they belong to the realm of the metaphysical. paintings “move” us, according to merleau-ponty: their “quality, light, color, depth […] awaken an echo in our bod[y] and […] our body welcomes them.”1 to encounter a painting is to apprehend it through one’s body. we constitute “brute meaning” by drawing upon the “fabric of the world” in which our bodies are inextricably caught.2 conversely, for barthes, poignant photographs “wound” us: they contain an “element [the punctum] that rises from the scene, shoots out of it like an arrow, and pierces” us.3 unlike merleau-ponty, barthes believes that pictures resist meaning-making. they provoke an “internal agitation,” an “animation” in the viewer. yet this “affect” cannot wholly be reduced or explained.4 hence, i think the crux of merleau-ponty’s and barthes’ disagreement about the ontology of image consciousness has to do with the possibility of meaning-making (or lack thereof ). while merleau-ponty believes that a painting can be meaningful and express the essential “indivisible whole[ness]” and “imperious 1 maurice merleau-ponty, “eye and mind,” in the merleau-ponty aesthetics reader, ed. galen johnson (evanston, il: northwestern up, 1993), 125. 2 ibid., 123. 3 roland barthes, camera lucida, trans. richard howard (new york: hill and wang, 1981), 26. 4 barthes, camera lucida, 19-20. 9issue vi ◆ spring 2019 merleau-ponty and barthes on image consciousness unity” of the world,5 barthes contends that “since every photograph is contingent (and thereby outside of meaning), photography cannot signify (aim at a generality) except by assuming a mask.”6 in this paper, i outline barthes’ critique of merleauponty’s phenomenology of painting—and his phenomenology more generally—and propose how we might explain the two philosophers’ disagreements on the subject. for merleau-ponty, paintings do more than just depict the world: they “attempt” to become “a piece of nature.”7 phenomenology, the philosophical current merleauponty belonged to, posits that as humans, we are embodied subjects living in the world, which we experience through our sensations (our perception). one’s body is not merely “a chunk of space or a bundle of functions” distinct from one’s consciousness; rather, one’s body is one’s consciousness.8 the soul “thinks according to the body, not according to itself ” because the body is what grounds all cognition. it is the “degree zero of spatiality” from which i see the world around me.9 in other words, it is impossible to understand the world “from the exterior” because i am “immersed” in it; i live it “from the inside.”10 the meaning that i give to the world is thus fundamentally informed by how i perceive it through my body. paintings, merleau-ponty contends, are the repositories of the meaning given to the painter through her vision and movement. the painter’s eye “is an instrument that moves itself, a means which invents its own ends; it is that which has been moved by some impact of the world, which it then restores to the visible through the traces of a hand.”11 for this reason, when we view a landscape painting by paul cézanne, we see how cézanne translated onto the canvas the sensations that he experienced when he laid eyes on a particular landscape.12 cézanne’s body was moved by the landscape that his eyes perceived, and this movement was transformed into the movement of his hands painting the landscape onto the canvas.13 as viewers, we see the painted landscape and are ourselves moved by it. thereby we imbue the painting with our own meaning(s). thus, the painting allows us not only to see as cézanne saw, but also to impart on it the countless other meanings that we may choose to give to it. for merleau-ponty, paintings are indeed inherently and endlessly meaningful. a person unfamiliar with the work of vincent van gogh might look at his painting wheatfield with crows (figure 1) and simply see a bright ochre wheat field under an inky blue sky. individuals who know that this was (supposedly) the last painting van gogh completed before committing suicide will likely add an extra layer of meaning 5 maurice merleau-ponty, “cézanne’s doubt,” in the merleau-ponty aesthetics reader, ed. galen johnson (evanston, il: northwestern up, 1993), 65. 6 barthes, camera lucida, 34. 7 merleau-ponty, “cézanne’s doubt,” 62 8 merleau-ponty, “eye and mind,” 124. 9 ibid., 138. 10 ibid. 11 ibid., 127. 12 merleau-ponty, “cézanne’s doubt,” 63. 13 ibid. 10 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college onto this first interpretation: they may see the artwork as an evocation of death (symbolized by the dark sky) looming over and encroaching upon life (symbolized by the vibrant wheat field). alternatively, an art historian might look at this painting and instead understand it through the lens of western art historical scholarship: she might take the flatness of the pictorial elements and the visibility of the brushstrokes as evidence that van gogh’s art foreshadowed modernism. a person who grew up on a farm and spent his childhood ploughing wheat fields may, upon viewing wheatfield with crows, be flooded with memories of his early years (such memories may include the first time his father showed him how to mount a horse, or the memory of running around the fields with his friends, or of how the fields smelled after the first snowfall). in each of these cases, individuals bestow onto van gogh’s painting meaning(s) that are informed by—but not limited to—her personal lived experience. giving meaning(s) to a painting, merleau-ponty argues, is an infinite act of interpretation: it is a hermeneutic.14 it is interpersonal and timeless; in fact, one person may give wheatfield with crows multiple different layers of meaning at different moments in her life. this shows that the process of meaning-making is never sterile nor static, but, instead, rich, fertile, and bound to never be fully complete.15 barthes’ account of meaning-making in photographs is markedly different. much like merleau-ponty, barthes thinks that pictures have the ability to “move” us (to borrow merleau-ponty’s language): they provoke a “pathos,” an “affect” in the “spectator [the viewer].”16 he pinpoints the source of affect as a detail he calls the “punctum,” which is present in every “attractive” photograph.17 on a mission to “formulate the fundamental feature, the universal without which there would be no photography,” barthes employs a “cynical phenomenology”18 in his analysis of photographs, which ultimately leads him to the conclusion that every compelling photo contains both a “studium” and a “punctum.”19 the studium, barthes posits, consists in “a kind of general, enthusiastic commitment […] without special acuity” that every photograph possesses.20 meaning “study” in latin, studium designates both a vague disinterest in the consumption of certain cultural products and a “kind of education” that allows one “to encounter the photographer’s intentions, to enter into harmony with them, to disapprove of them, but always to understand them, to argue them within myself for culture (from which the studium derives) is a contract arrived at between creators and consumers.”21 the photographer (“operator”) communicates her intended meaning by using visual codes that are universal and can thus be deciphered by spectators.22 barthes uses william klein’s photo, “mayday, 1959,” as an example. in this picture, 14 merleau-ponty, “eye and mind,” 149. 15 ibid. 16 barthes, camera lucida, 21. 17 ibid, 27. 18 ibid., 9. 19 ibid., 26. 20 ibid. 21 barthes, camera lucida, 27-28. 22 ibid., 28. 11issue vi ◆ spring 2019 merleau-ponty and barthes on image consciousness the studium would be the fact that i can make sense of the subject of the photo, and that i can learn certain ethnographical and historical details by examining it.23 i can discern a black and white photograph of an old woman with a suspicious glance, who is surrounded by a few men of different ages. i notice that one boy is wearing a blazer, that another has a youthful haircut, and that the old woman is wearing a scarf around her head, for instance. the photograph “teaches me how russians dress” in moscow in 1959.24 in other words, i recognize this picture as a “good [coherent and identifiable] historical scene.”25 however, without searching for it, there is an “element” in this photograph that “rises from the scene, shoots out of it like an arrow, and pierces me.”26 barthes names this element the punctum and defines it as “that accident which pricks me (but also bruises me, is poignant to me).”27 he claims that the punctum is usually a small detail that was not strictly intended by the operator. its “wounding” quality cannot be analyzed or studied, but is instead “given right there on the page” and resonates with the spectator.28 barthes seems to imply that a photograph’s punctum may differ from one spectator to another when he says that “to give examples of punctum is, in a certain fashion, to give myself up.”29 if we accept this and grant that a punctum is subjective, then we may posit that what “wounds” an individual depends on that individual’s past lived experiences. nevertheless, if one tests this out phenomenologically, one quickly finds that what wounds someone does not always directly map onto that person’s past memories, and thus cannot be easily explained. for example, in james van der zee’s “family portrait” (figure 3), barthes identifies the punctum as the “belt worn low” by, and the “strapped pumps”30 of, the woman standing behind the chair. barthes is baffled by the fact that this detail strikes him: “(mary janes – why does this dated fashion touch me? i mean: to what date does it refer me?).”31 personally, when i look at this picture, the detail i identify as the punctum is the seated woman’s right hand. when i try to understand why this element in particular “pricks” me, i can only say that the way in which the hand curves awkwardly over the armrest, and how one finger seems abnormally long, makes me uncomfortable, or “creeps me out.” this, however, is not a satisfying answer. what exactly bothers me about this woman’s hand? why do the strapped pumps arouse “great sympathy [and] almost a kind of tenderness” in barthes?32 23 ibid., 30. 24 ibid., 30. 25 ibid., 26. 26 ibid. 27 barthes, camera lucida, 26. 28 ibid., 43. 29 ibid. 30 ibid. 31 ibid. 32 barthes, camera lucida, 43 12 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college the punctum significantly impacts one’s understanding of the photograph: it “lashe[s]” the order and facile meaning of the studium and “changes my reading [of the photograph]”, “mark[ing] [it] in my eyes with a higher value.”33 ever since the woman’s right hand in james van der zee’s “family portrait” “punctured” me, the only thing i can see when i look at that photograph is that gnarled hand. as barthes succinctly puts it, the punctum suddenly—and paradoxically—“while remaining a ‘detail,’ fills the whole picture.”34 yet, as barthes asks, why is this the case? why must i disturb the “unity of composition” that was found in the studium that constituted “family portrait” before the punctum wounded me?35 after all, “whether or not [the punctum] is triggered, it is an addition. it is what i add to the photograph and what is nonetheless already there.”36 why must this addition—this newfound meaning i give to “family portrait”—be made? why must the facile meaning of its studium (which allows me to understand the picture in historical/ethnographical terms, as a family portrait of an african american family living in harlem in 1926) be supplanted by the deeply disturbing and incomplete meaning engendered by the punctum, which reduces the entire photograph to the creepy hand? moreover, why do i choose to impart meaning to something that seems irreducible, that seems to resist it?37 i continue to ask: why do i think the woman’s hand is creepy? if this persistent uncertainty tells me anything, it is that “the incapacity to name is a good symptom of disturbance.”38 attempting to answer these questions, barthes draws on certain notions of psychoanalytic theory. he introduces the concept of heimlich39 (german for “familiar,” “native,” “belonging to the home”), which closely relates to its opposite notion, unheimlich (german for “uncanny”), an idea that is discussed in freud’s essay, “the uncanny.”40 freud defines “the uncanny” as “an experience of tension” that belongs to “that class of the terrifying which leads back to something long known to us, once very familiar.”41 freud uses “the double” as an example of the uncanny: having connections with “reflections in mirrors, with shadows, spirits, with the belief in the soul and the fear of death,” seeing one’s doppelgänger (for instance, when i look at a picture of myself or catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror) “arouses dread and creeping horror.”42 though uncanny situations occur in real life, freud argues that the uncanny is also “an aesthetic category”: the feeling can emerge when we consume literature, songs, movies, and other art forms.43 personally, one of the first 33 ibid., 42. 34 ibid., 45. 35 ibid., 41. 36 ibid., 55. 37 barthes, camera lucida, 21. 38 ibid., 51. 39 ibid., 40. 40 sigmund freud, “the uncanny,” 2, accessed 2 december 2017, http://web.mit.edu/allanmc/www/freud1.pdf. 41 freud, “the uncanny,” 2. 42 ibid., 10. 43 ibid., 2. 13issue vi ◆ spring 2019 merleau-ponty and barthes on image consciousness artworks that comes to mind when i think of the uncanny is lars von trier’s film breaking the waves (1996) (figure 4), which tells the story of bess, an unusual woman who is in love with her husband jan, an oil rig worker who asks her to have sex with other men after he is gravely injured in a work accident. it is a dark, tragic story of sexual debasement, religious paranoia and death. these are certainly disturbing themes, but i do not know exactly why breaking the waves disturbs me more than most horror movies, which deal with similarly frightening topics such as murder, torture, and ghosts. this inability to explain fully my uneasiness or to give meaning to my experience is precisely what constitutes the uncanny, according to freud: “we, with the superiority of rational minds, are able to detect the sober truth; and yet this knowledge does not lessen the impression of uncanniness in the least degree.”44 in photographs, what is uncanny is the punctum, which, as we have said, is the detail in the photo that pricks me, that disrupts the studium’s harmony, order, and identifiable meaning. to make sense of the punctum and of the uncanny, we may turn to freud’s “beyond the pleasure principle.” in his 1920 essay, he postulates the existence of two fundamental principles that drive human behavior: the pleasure principle and the “death instinct.”45 the pleasure principle states that our bodies (and minds) are designed to rid themselves of tension (what freud calls “unpleasure”; this includes hunger, thirst, and sexual desire), such that all of our actions are motivated by “a lowering of that tension – that is, […] an avoidance of unpleasure or a production of pleasure.”46 this drive is productive and life-sustaining, as it seeks to restore our constitution to a state of balance and harmony. at first glance, this seems intuitive and accurate. yet, upon treating numerous patients who suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder, freud realized that the pleasure principle offered an incomplete account of human behaviour. his patients, most of whom had fought in world war i, would constantly recall their most painful memories (consciously, in therapy and unconsciously, in dreams), “reviv[ing] them with the greatest ingenuity.”47 but this repetition is stale, unproductive, and contradicts the pleasure principle: instead of releasing tension, this “compulsion to repeat” only heightens tension, only disturbs our constitution, and only generates imbalance and chaos.48 freud cannot explain these “mysterious masochistic trends of the ego” that all humans seem to bear, but nonetheless we cannot deny their existence.49 this leads him to posit the existence of a second fundamental drive that opposes the pleasure principle and seeks to negate it: the “death instinct.”50 44 freud, “the uncanny,” 7. 45 sigmund freud, salman akhtar, and mary k. o'neil, on freud's "beyond the pleasure principle" (london: karnac books, 2011), 55. 46 freud et al., “beyond the pleasure principle,” 13. 47 freud et al., “beyond the pleasure principle,” 27. 48 ibid., 25. 49 ibid., 19. 50 ibid., 55. 14 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college freud’s account of these two antagonistic—but intertwined—drives maps onto barthes’ theory of photography. the pleasure principle (or “eros”) corresponds to the studium: both embody harmony, order, balance, cohesion, and meaning. meanwhile, the death instinct is analogous to the punctum. both the death instinct and the punctum disturb the harmony and meaning of the pleasure principle and the studium, respectively. this meaning is intelligible: james van der zee’s “family portrait” is the picture of an african-american family living in harlem in 1926. the woman’s eerie hand becomes such a fixation to me that i ignore all of the other elements present in “family portrait”; the death instinct causes traumatic war memories to repeatedly resurface in freud’s patients’ minds, thereby shattering all semblance of serenity, harmony, or meaning. both cases indeed resist meaning: nothing can fully capture what makes the contorted hand creepy to me, and nothing can explain why this particular detail resonates within me but not necessarily within every other spectator. likewise, the veterans’ stale repetition of painful memories cannot be contextualized by any philosophical or scientific system; it refuses to be understood within the organized, satisfying framework of the pleasure principle. thus, barthes’ main disagreement with merleau-ponty has to do with the latter’s belief that images (and especially paintings) are endlessly meaningful. according to barthes, pictures have a limited semiology: “all we can say is that the [photograph] speaks, it induces us, vaguely to think.”51 the photograph’s meaning is evident and restrained: it can be recognized by any spectator. indeed, anyone who looks at william klein’s “mayday, 1959” will say that it is a picture of an old woman with a scarf wrapped around her head, gazing menacingly at the lens, and surrounded by seven men of varying ages. more specifically, the work’s title informs us that these people are in moscow in 1959. this is the definite subject of “mayday, 1959”: the photo will never be about tulips in seventeenth century amsterdam, or fishermen in nineteenth century brazil. thus, even though an image may provoke different emotions in viewers, the image’s meaning will always be contingent, circumscribed, and “a closed field of forces.”52 it is therefore incorrect to claim, as merleau-ponty would, that “mayday, 1959” can be interpreted in an infinite number of ways. spectators might be wounded by different punctums, which are, as barthes puts it, “outside of meaning.”53 however, for all viewers the photo’s studium, which “aim[s] at generality […] by assuming a mask,” is the same.54 barthes challenges merleau-ponty’s contention that paintings “come to life” and make visible “the overtaking, the overlapping, the metamorphosis […] of time.”55 instead, barthes claims, they freeze time: they capture a moment that is dead and that is bound never to happen again. barthes indeed believes that death “is the eidos” (the 51 barthes, camera lucida, 38. 52 ibid., 13. 53 barthes, camera lucida, 34. 54 ibid. 55 merleau-ponty, “eye and mind,” 145. 15issue vi ◆ spring 2019 merleau-ponty and barthes on image consciousness essence) of photography.56 to view a photo capturing a moment that one has lived is to be reminded of the fleetingness of one’s life and of the inevitability of death. many photographs—especially ones dating back to a time when sitters had to pose for several hours when they had their picture taken—possess a haunting, “deathly” quality. (“family portrait” is the perfect example of this phenomenon: the figures appear to be spectral—far from “life-like.”) barthes argues that the experience of being photographed is also like death: the photographer’s “target” (subject) experiences “a micro-version of death (of parenthesis): i am truly becoming a specter, […] death in person.”57 this is because i feel like i am being transformed from a “subject into [an] object”: whenever someone takes my picture, i feel a strange sense of inauthenticity, for i perceive my “real” self being misrepresented—distorted even—by the camera lens.58 conscious that i am being watched (and “captured” by another person), i pose and change my behaviour in a “cunning dissociation of consciousness from identity.”59 moreover, when i look at a portrait of myself, i feel alienated, for my deep “self ” “never coincides with my image”: while i am “light,” moving, and alive, my image is “heavy [and] motionless”—in short, dead.60 it is no coincidence then that barthes relates photography to freud’s “death instinct.” death punctures life much like the punctum disrupts the studium and the death drive obstructs the pleasure principle. life is not intrinsically meaningful; rather, we bestow meaning onto it because our existence would seem pointless otherwise. by extension, paintings can never be “alive” or meaningful in the way that merleau-ponty claims they are. hence, merleau-ponty and barthes appear to be in a stalemate on the question of meaning-making in image consciousness. merleau-ponty offers a convincing argument for the hermeneutic possibilities of painting, but his theory does not consider the death instinct. moreover, while both philosophers agree that images have the ability to affect us (whether by wounding us or by moving us), barthes’ concepts of the studium and the punctum do not easily map onto merleau-ponty’s theory. this makes comparing both accounts tricky. added to this is the fact that they focus on different visual mediums: barthes mostly talks about photography, whereas merleau-ponty only discusses painting. the two thus seem to approach the same question with a different set of considerations, and this might be why they arrive at radically different conclusions. perhaps merleau-ponty crystallizes the conundrum best: “ambiguity is the essence of human existence, and everything we live or think has always several meanings,”—including meaninglessness.61 ◆ 56 barthes, camera lucida, 15. 57 barthes, 14. 58 ibid., 13. 59 barthes, camera lucida, 12. 60 ibid. 61 richard askay and jensen farquhar, apprehending the inaccessible: freudian psychoanalysis and existential phenomenology (evanston, il: northwestern university press, 2006), 296. 16 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college figure 1: vincent van gogh, wheatfield with crows, 1890. 50.2 cm × 103 cm (19.9 in × 40.6 in). van gogh museum, amsterdam. figure 2: william klein, “mayday, 1959”. moscow, 1959. 17issue vi ◆ spring 2019 merleau-ponty and barthes on image consciousness figure 3: james van der zee, “family portrait”. harlem, 1926. figure 4: lars von trier, breaking the waves (1996). 18 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college bibliography askay, richard, and jensen farquhar. apprehending the inaccessible: freudian psychoanalysis and existential phenomenology. evanston, il: northwestern university press, 2006. barthes, roland. camera lucida. translated by richard howard. new york: hill and wang, 1981. freud, sigmund, salman akhtar, and mary k. o'neil. on freud's "beyond the pleasure principle." london: karnac books, 2011. freud, sigmund. “the uncanny.” accessed 2 december 2017. http://web.mit.edu/ allanmc/www/freud1.pdf. merleau-ponty, maurice. “cézanne’s doubt.” in the merleau-ponty aesthetics reader, 59-75. edited by galen johnson. evanston, il: northwestern up, 1993. merleau-ponty, maurice. “eye and mind”. in the merleau-ponty aesthetics reader, 121-149. edited by galen johnson. evanston, il: northwestern up, 1993. 36 δι αν οι α sound as silence: nothingness in the music of anton webern and john cage chenyu bu when i consider the short duration of my life, swallowed up in an eternity before and after, the little space i fill engulfed in the infinite immensity of spaces whereof i know nothing, and which know nothing of me, i am terrified. the eternal silence of these infinite spaces frightens me.1 —blaise pascal, pensées 1. introduction ever since the rise of modern science, the world has no longer been experienced as an ‘enchanted garden,’ where nature was meaningful and governed by intrinsic value-filled orders. evoked by this disenchantment with the world, the senses of loneliness and homelessness are well-captured in french philosopher blaise pascal’s writings, which—centuries later—are escalated further by existential ideology’s disenchantment with being. in being and nothingness, inspired by the question concerning being raised in martin heidegger’s being and time, sartre presents nothingness as the foundation for being and the origin of its nihilation, i.e. the non-being. the experience of nothingness makes possible being’s encounter with its non-being through the consciousness of freedom. the realization that there is nothing other than the nothingness separating being from non-being is the source of forlornness—anguish2 in sartre’s terminology—inherent to being itself. 1 blaise pascal, and thomas stearns eliot, pascal's pensées; introduction by ts eliot, (ep dutton), 1958. 2 charles b. guignon, and derk pereboom, existentialism: basic writings, (indianapolis: hackett, 2001), 325. 37issue vii ◆ spring 2020 sound as silence the notion of the silence of the infinite space invoked by pascal, however, sheds light upon a broader interpretation of sartrean nothingness beyond the paradigm of being; namely, to the world of sound. in this essay, i extend the notion of nothingness to silence in contrast with sound and discuss silence as an act of expression and artistic interrogation in contemporary classical music. i propose beginning our discussion with a reconstruction of sartre’s deduction for nothingness through a regressive course of arguments that traces back to being’s relation to the world. from there, i provide an exposition of sound based on the concept of a total sound-space3—bound by our pure auditory experience while silence as the non-being of sound originates from sartrean nothingness. i then distinguish between absolute and relative silence, being primarily concerned with the latter, and further explicate the relation of sound to silence as analogous to that of being to non-being. observing, of course, that varying techniques in music approach silence differently, i focus specifically on contemporary repertoires and analyze the role of silence in the third movement of five pieces for orchestra by anton webern and 4’33” by john cage as an embodiment of nothingness in the sound-space. 2. non-being and the origin of nothingness in being and nothingness, sartre introduces his discussion of being with the recognition that being—as the totality “man-in-the-world”4—is a synthetic relation between man and world.5 this relation can only be established in the being by a self-interrogating question,6 but even the question presupposes both “a being who questions and a being [that] is questioned,”7 and an expected reply from the being in question of either an affirmation of yes or a negation of no (hence, the question itself permits the possibility of a negative reply).8 in the case of being, such a negation would imply the objective existence of a non-being, that is, an absence of a synthetic self-relation between being and the being-in-the-world, be it non-knowing with the interrogative attitude, non-existence of a transcendent being, or the non-being of limitation.9 the permanent possibility of non-being conditions the inquiry about being by limiting its reply (i.e. being is but nothing outside of being, and is, therefore, encompassed with non-being). the negation is not merely a quality of judgement following a pre-judicative attitude, but rather, a consequence of the apprehension of nothingness that always appears 3 the phrase “total sound-space” refers to john cage’s discussion of sound: john cage, silence: lectures and writings, (wesleyan university press, 1961), 9. 4 charles b. guignon, and derk pereboom, existentialism: basic writings, (indianapolis: hackett, 2001), 310. 5 ibid, pg. 310. 6 the term “being” here refers to heidegger’s dasein in being and time, i.e. the being to whom the meaning of being is concerned: charles b. guignon, and derk pereboom, existentialism: basic writings, (indianapolis: hackett, 2001), 216-217. 7 guignon and pereboom, existentialism: basic writings, 310. 8 ibid, pg. 310. 9 ibid, pg. 311. 38 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college within the limits of expectation.10 for instance, a café is full positivity by itself, but when sartre enters it with the expectation of meeting pierre there only not to find him, the café recedes into nothingness as the undifferentiated ground in his search for pierre.11 in seeking pierre out, sartre adopts the attitude of interrogation in expectation of one reply of two possibilities; that is, the presence or the absence of pierre such that nothingness is not subjective, but rather, a “real event” objectively grounding the negation. therefore, nothingness is the origin and foundation for the negation. the negation presupposed by the question concerning being necessitates the objective existence of nothingness. nothingness, however, is neither causa sui—since it does not nihilate itself—nor derived from being (which in its own right possesses full positivity and lacks structure, thereby making it non-relational to nothingness). from this deduction it follows that nothingness originates only from the being for whom the nothingness of being remains in question.12 in the state of self-detachment, the being whose questions could nihilate nothingness in relation to himself disassociates from the causal series, and then nihilates himself from nothingness anticipating the possibility of non-being from its own being.13 in other words, nothingness comes to things through their own being, which then, logically, means that their nothingness must belong to them. 3. silence as non-being of sound given that being is such that nothingness comes to the world as the origin of its own non-being, a parallel relation can be reasoned to the auditory world, wherein nothingness can be elicited from sound as the origin of silence. to begin with, sound exists as a particular relation to the total sound-space, bound by our pure auditory experience. the relation of a particular sound to the sound-space is defined by five specific determinants: frequency (pitch), amplitude (loudness), overtone structure (timbre), duration, and morphology (how the sound begins, goes on, and dies away).14 since even one alteration of at least one of the five determinants changes how sound is perceived, the relation of sound to the sound-space must be fluid. therefore, sound could be regarded as a continuum within the total sound-space for which the five determinants are limited by our own sense of audibility. now that sound has been presented as a relation to the sound-space, a question concerning sound—corresponding to the question concerning being—could be formulated as follows: is there any five-determinant combination that can determine 10 ibid, pg. 313. 11 guignon and pereboom, existentialism: basic writings, 316. 12 ibid, pg. 319. 13 ibid, pg. 320. 14 john cage, silence: lectures and writings, 9. 39issue vii ◆ spring 2020 sound as silence a particular sound in relation to the sound-space? following the deduction, the question itself permits a reply that entails the possibility of a negation: no, such a relation does not exist. what gives rise to such a negation is silence, i.e. the sound lacking the five-determinant relation to the sound-space. in the auditory world, this negation implies the objective existence of silence, and it thus follows that sound encompassed with silence in that sound—as a continuum— is defined by its (changing) relation to the sound-space (but nothing outside of it). hence, silence is the non-being of sound with three possible forms: the non-being of knowing if a relation exists, the possibility of non-being of the sound in question, and the nonbeing of limitation.15 as previously discussed, a negation is not simply a quality of judgement, but a consequence of the apprehension of nothingness due to the limits of expectation.16 therefore, silence, as the negative reply to the question concerning sound has its origin and foundation in sartrean nothingness. from here, i would like to pause the regressive deduction to distinguish between two types of silence: absolute silence and relative silence. silence characterized by the lack of relation seems to imply an absence, or the non-existence of the five-determinant combination, which is the clearly defined opposite of the presence or the existence of such without any quantifiable parameter, which in turn, could scale the “level of existence”. therefore, silence as the lack of relation to the sound-space seems to be dialectically absolute. in reality, however, we cannot perceive any such sound as absolute silence. even if one enters into a sound-proof or anechoic chamber, he can still hear at least two kinds of sound produced by himself: his nerve’s systematic operation and his blood’s circulation,17 which both have their own relations to the sound-space—“[t]here is always something to listen to.”18 however, we do perceive silence, or the absence of perceivable sound on various occasions; for example, at a concert between two movements of a symphony, or simply when we enter a quiet library from a busy street. at those moments, no sound from the five-determinant relation comes into the presence of our auditory experience (at least temporarily) because the sounds presented to, and expected by, us—the orchestra or the street sound—disappear, and the sounds outside of our expectation have not yet come into our awareness. it is not difficult to notice that the brief pause of the orchestral sound between movements is filled with the audience’s breathing, or perhaps the rustling of clothes, and even a quiet library might be filled with the sound of air flow produced by the ventilation system. just as the room tone in a movie scene, these sounds normally fall into the background of our unconsciousness where we fail to map them into the sound-space by the five-determinant relations and take them as the silence—the lack of relation to the sound-space. the notion of relative silence, 15 i made a reference to sartre’s characterization of three types of non-being: guignon and pereboom, existentialism: basic writings, 311. 16 see note 10 above. 17 john cage, silence: lectures and writings, 13. 18 samuel beckett, stories and texts for nothing, (new york: grove p, 1967), 35/155. 40 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college therefore, describes sounds that we are unaware of, all of which characterized by the absence of a perceivable relation to the sound-space whereby they manifest themselves as silence in our auditory experience. note that any sound categorized as relative silence always has the potential, given that we are able to adjust our expectation and actively hear it, to become sound to our ears with its own relation to the total soundspace. since it is the relative silence that we hear as silence, the rest of this paper only concerns itself with relative silence. given that silence has its origin and foundation in nothingness, nothingness must objectively exist in order to make our apprehension of silence possible. similar to the case of being, i argue that nothingness comes into the sound-space as the origin of silence, or of the non-being of sound, precisely through sound itself. on one hand, silence cannot be derived from sound. it would be inconceivable that a particular sound of full positivity in its five-determinant relation at the same time maintains in our awareness a representation of silence as its non-being.19 the notion of (relative) silence asserts that silence by nature has the potential to possess a relation to soundspace as a continuum. as a result, every heard sound becomes based on a subjective situation constructed essentially by the relationship between sound and another sound (i.e. the sound of relative silence, rather than an objective situation where sounds are the negative of silence or vice versa20). one should be able to think of sound “without considering it negatively,”21 that is to say, sound is not conceived as an absence or nihilation of silence. rather, a particular sound is heard against its (relative) silence in that our perception distinguishes it with the full positivity by our awareness of it. this distinction asserts that we cannot both perceive and be unaware of a particular sound; ergo, it is non-relational to silence, or to its non-being. on the other hand, silence is not causa sui. the property of “nihilating itself ”22 cannot be granted to silence because silence cannot be perceived alone—we always listen to something whose existence as a continuum establishes our expectation, such as the sound of our nerve’s system operation and the blood’s circulation in an anechoic chamber. even when all sounds actively heard by us suddenly disappear, what has blended into the background of silence immediately emerges in our awareness as the new continuum in the sound-space. therefore, a sound that recedes to silence, as soon as it is left by itself, will be heard as the sound of full positivity with a specific relation to the sound-space. the interrelation of sound and silence can be considered bi-directional, where silence allows sounds to appear, yet, at the same time depends on the presence of sound to remain its non-existence to our perception. 19 i made a reference to sartre’s argument that non-being is not derived from being: see note 12 above. 20 “subjective situation” and “objective situation” are the phrases used by john cage in the discussion of silence: john cage, silence: lectures and writings, 14. 21 eric de visscher, "'there's no such thing as silence...': john cage's poetics of silence", in interface 18.4 (1989), 259. 22 guignon and pereboom, existentialism: basic writings, 318. 41issue vii ◆ spring 2020 sound as silence this “symbiosis of opposites”23 can be simplified to the fact that something requires nothingness in order to appear and that nothingness requires something in order to maintain its nothingness. the deduction reveals that silence is neither derived from sound nor self-caused, and it follows that nothingness as the origin of silence must be embodied in sound itself as a potential or possibility of becoming its non-being (i.e. the silence). 4. silence in webern, five pieces for orchestra, iii and cage, 4’33” in modernist music repertoires, silence is considered to be state of “a sonic and/ or conceptual ideal”24 to which a work aspires. the purity, complexity and fragmentary in the sonic state of silence becomes a new compositional focus. drawn by the perishability of sound and the proximity to nothingness that is feared and simultaneously aspired to, in silence, modernist composers aim to achieve such a state through musical languages. now given that silence as the non-being of sound has its origin and foundation in sartrean nothingness, in this section, i discuss the approach to silence in contemporary classical music; specifically, in the third movement of five pieces for orchestra by anton webern25 and 4’33” by john cage26 as a way of evoking an experience of sartrean nothingness. in his works, anton webern appeals to nothingness not by patches of quietness gapped in rests and pauses as the classic and the early romantic composers do, but rather, in relying on musical means to evoke the sense of silence as in the third movement of five pieces for orchestra (which depicts a mountain vista). with the dynamic marking pianississimo,27 the opening campanella28 creates a sense of stillness, which swells with the shimmering sound made by mandolin, guitar, harp, and celesta. each individual tone in the opening sound’s chromatic cluster29 is struck repeatedly or rolled on strings, and creates in effect a sustained, yet vibrating sonority.30 since all but one of the tones of the cluster are a semitone apart from each other, the sound creates a seemingly chaotic silence, but accurately conveys the sound of nature and the serenity residing in the mountain. the violin enters later with a slightly louder dynamic playing a fragmented four-note melody, which is then echoed by a muted 23 “symbiosis of opposites” is a phrase deborah weagel uses in the discussion of cage’s notion of silence: deborah weagel, and john cage. "silence in john cage and samuel beckett: 4' 33" and "waiting for godot"." samuel beckett today / aujourd'hui 12 (2002), 6. 24 david metzer, "modern silence," the journal of musicology, vol. 23, no. 3 (2006): 333. 25 anton webern, “sehr langsam und ausserst zart”, track 15 on webern: passacaglia / symphony / five pieces, ulster orchestra, takuo yuasa, naxos 8.554841, 2001, compact disc. 26 john cage, “4’33””, track 14 on cage, j.: primitive / in a landscape / a room / variations i / waiting / 4' 33'' / dream / suite for toy piano (happy birthday john!) (cage, sacchi). john cage. floraleda sacchi. amadeus arte aap12001, 2012, compact disc. 27 musical term, meaning “very very softly”. 28 a percussion instrument, meaning “little bell”. 29 musical term, referring to a chord made of several tones in a pitch class. 30 david metzer, "modern silence," the journal of musicology, vol. 23, no. 3 (2006): 340. 42 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college horn. as the echo fades away, the previous sonority of stillness gradually converges to silence. the rest of the movement is a continuation of the dwindling of soft sonority with the nothingness. webern creates the sounds that appear to be fragile in the beginning—with their softness and extreme instability due to the semitones—but as they keep vibrating as the only sound in the piece, we hear them struggling to escape from silence before finally give in. in this piece, the silence is heard with sonic density. the musical means used by webern to capture the quality of silence become interpreted as stillness, softness, hush, and fragmentation.31 when something elicits nothing, silences itself becomes the act of expression itself.32 webern’s piece (1913) premiered much earlier than the publication of sartre’s being and nothingness (1943), but it demonstrates at the very least that the once clear distinction between sound and silence had already been blurred well before the french philosopher’s investigation of the phenomenon. retrospectively, webern’s approach to silence through sound could be regarded as a way to evoke the nothingness that sartre later systematically derives from his notion of being. as a proximity to nothingness, the dwindling soft sonority in the music can easily fall out of our awareness along with silence, but they could always be dissected from silence by its constantly vibrating and changing texture. however, whether it is heard as sound or silence, the nature of the sound itself does not change, since it either possesses or has the potential to possess the definite five-determinant relation to the total sound-space. therefore, this particular piece by webern alludes to the later recognition that nothingness as the origin of silence comes from nowhere else but sound itself. silence, as realized in later modernist styles, transcends from an act of expression to an attitude of interrogation. john cage, for example, was the first composer who sought the state of pure silence in his works, and his legendary piece 4’33” (1952)33 does not contain even a single note—ushering in four minutes and thirty-three seconds of essential silence as its title indicates. in the text silence, cage makes a distinction between the intentional and unintentional sound.34 for a listener, what we traditionally regard as intentional is the sound heard with a particular relation to the sound-space, while what regarded as unintentional we are unaware of (and it consequently recedes into silence). the sound made by the orchestra at a concert according to the notes on music sheets is the intentional making, while the other sounds, for instance, breathing and clothes rustling, are the unintentional. in 4’33”, by excluding the instrumental sounds that are normally conceived as intentional, cage alters the audience’s expectation by switching the unintentional sound in the surrounding environment to the intentional—he invites the silence into our auditory 31 ibid, pg. 334. 32 ibid, pg. 336. 33 the title of this work is the total length in minutes and seconds of the performance. at woodstock, n.y., august 29, 1952, the title was 4’33” and the three parts ware 33”, 2’40”, and 1’20”. it was performed by david tudor, pianist, who indicated the beginnings of parts by closing, the endings by opening, the keyboard lid. however, the work may be performed by any instrumentalist, or combination of instrumentalists and last any length of time. 34 john cage, silence: lectures and writings, 14. 43issue vii ◆ spring 2020 sound as silence experience as sounds. since silence cannot be perceived by itself, the audience are encouraged to listen actively to those sounds that might otherwise be silence for them. here, standing on the borderland between sound and silence, cage captures their structural alteration by being conscious of their intimate relationship, thereby demonstrating the relation between being and non-being. just like the consciousness of being, the consciousness of sound in this piece suspends the presupposed distinction between the intentional and unintentional sound, and in that act, the supposedly unintentional sounds that once were the non-being of sound are now made aware by us and determined by their specific relation to the sound-space as the new continuum in our auditory experience. since there is nothing that separates sound from silence, as illustrated in this piece by cage, nothingness slips into the cleavage introduced by the suspension of consciousness. the notion of nothingness, then, elucidates the (non-)identity of silence with sound: silence is the being of sound, in the mode of not being it. 5. implication what are the implications of the abstract dialectic of nothingness in the world of sound to our auditory experience in daily life? can the interplay between sound and nothingness go beyond the notion of silence? i would like to offer some preliminary sketches to answer these questions in this final section. in the history of western music, silence has never been equal to sound until the rise of modernism in the early twentieth century. the moments of silence in music had been generally considered as “supposed non-sound”, which inevitably served as the backdrop against which ‘real sound’ could be presented and dissected.35 those silent moments in music tend to be experienced as expressive quietness; for example, the tense pauses in the opening measure in haydn’s string quartet, op. 76, no. 5 “finale,” or the quiet stillness in introit of berlioz’s requiem. later, as composers gradually shifted away from the conventional musical elements—such as harmony, melody, or texture—that the classical and romantic period exploited, music was taken to a broader sonic aspect, where silence as the previously supposed absence of expressive utterances became an act of expression itself. with the realization that sound is inseparable from silence, modern composers began to welcome silence in their works. as the boundary between sound and silence is blurred, so does the boundary between what is music and what is not—from stravinsky’s rite of spring to schoenberg’s twelve-tone theory to the later serialism led by boulez. composers constantly challenged these originally absolute binary distinctions, all of which arguably relate to the existential notion of nothingness, which derived an even broader implication: there is nothing separating something from nothing. as a result, in terms 35 david metzer, "modern silence," the journal of musicology, vol. 23, no. 3 (2006): 336. 44 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college of our own auditory experience, music seems to become an arbitrary limitation to how we perceive the sound in the world. cage describes music as “an organization of sound,”36 but what is organization? when we contemplate the question, it seems that everything could be an organization; for example, nature, industry, society, and therefore, anything could be heard as music—as cage writes himself: wherever we are, what we hear is mostly noise. when we ignore it, it disturbs us. when we listen to it, we find it fascinating. the sound of a truck at fifty miles per hour. static between the stations. rain. we want to capture and control these sounds, to use them not as sound effects but as musical instruments.37 all sounds, including “noise,” are music. the notion of noise, however, has not been mentioned or discussed in this paper. it is not normally active in our perception because it is too disturbing to be aware of constantly, so it lacks a definite relation to the sound-space, (at least for most of us). at the same time, it is not part of relative silence either because we might find it disturbing even if we are not completely aware of it. thus, “[n]oise is the last thing that separates us from silence.”38 given the analogy between the dialectic of being and nothingness and that of sound and silence, an interesting topic left for future discussion might be centered around the notion of noise (an unescapable element from our normal auditory experience) and how it fits into this essay’s conceptual scheme of sound and silence, relates to sartre’s understanding of nothingness, and whether or not there is a defining quality to noise such that it does not fall into pure value judgement. ◆ 36 john cage, silence: lectures and writings, 3. 37 ibid. 38 david metzer, "modern silence," the journal of musicology, vol. 23, no. 3 (2006): 369. 45issue vii ◆ spring 2020 sound as silence bibliography beckett, samuel. nouvelles et textes pour rien. paris: minuit, 1955. beckett, samuel. stories and texts for nothing. new york: grove p, 1967. cage, john. “4’33””, track 14 on cage, j.: primitive / in a landscape / a room / variations i / waiting / 4' 33'' / dream / suite for toy piano (happy birthday john!) (cage, sacchi). john cage. floraleda sacchi. amadeus arte aap12001, 2012, compact disc. cage, john. 4’33”. second tacet edition ep6777. edition peters no. 6777, 1953. cage, john. silence: lectures and writings. wesleyan university press, 1961. de visscher, eric, "'there's no such thing as silence...': john cage's poetics of silence", in interface 18.4 (1989), 257-268. guignon, charles b, and derk pereboom. existentialism: basic writings. indianapolis: hackett, 2001. link, stan. "much ado about nothing." perspectives of new music, vol. 33, no. 1/2 (1995): 216-72. www.jstor.org/stable/833707. metzer, david. "modern silence." the journal of musicology, vol. 23, no. 3 (2006): 331-74. doi:10.1525/jm.2006.23.3.331. pascal, blaise, and thomas stearns eliot. pascal's pensées; introduction by ts eliot. ep dutton, 1958. sartre, jean-paul, and hazel estella barnes. being and nothingness. london: methuen, 1966. weagel, deborah, and john cage. "silence in john cage and samuel beckett: 4' 33" and "waiting for godot"." samuel beckett today / aujourd'hui 12 (2002): 249-62. www.jstor.org/stable/25781422. weber, max. “science as a vocation,” in from max weber: essays in sociology. new york: oxford university press, 1919/1946. webern, anton. “sehr langsam und ausserst zart”, track 15 on webern: passacaglia / symphony / five pieces. ulster orchestra. yuasa, takuo. naxos 8.554841, 2001, compact disc. δι αν οι α 56 art, technology, and truth in the thought of martin heidegger felipe daniel montero in mythology, autochthones (from the ancient greek αὐτός "self," and χθών "soil"; i.e. "people sprung from earth itself ") are those mortals who have sprung from the soil, rocks and trees. they are rooted and belong to the land eternally.1 i. introduction in his “deromanticizing heidegger,” american philosopher don ihde attempts to denounce some arbitrary stances in martin heidegger’s thought in order to propose a philosophy of technology purged of what he deems the philosopher’s romantic, and implicitly nazi, preferences. ihde begins in stating: “a century after his birth, two very contrary statements can be made concerning martin heidegger: first, in a significant sense, he is surely one of the most important founders of the philosophy of technology […] second, we all also know that he joined the national socialist german workers' party and remained with it through the war […] my question is this: is there something at the very heart of heidegger's thought that makes both of these contraries possible?”2 the aim of this present work attempts to answer ihde’s question following a close reading of heidegger’s public speech “memorial address” 1 josine h blok. “gentrifying genealogy: on the genesis of the athenian autochthony myth.” in ancient myth. media, transformations and sense-constructions, 251–75. edited by ueli dill and christine walde. (berlin: de gruyter, 2009), 261. 2 don ihde, heidegger’s technologies: postphenomenological perspectives, (new york, fordham university press, 2010), 74. 57issue vii ◆ spring 2020 art, technology, and truth (gelassenheit).3 if we assess the rest of heidegger’s works in light of this speech, then it is possible to reach a systematic understanding of the relationships that exist between art, technology and truth in heidegger’s thought. in turn, this analysis specifically allows us to appreciate what aspects of heidegger’s philosophy lead him to his socalled romanticism and the consequent error of subscribing to nazism. finally, this essay also explains how, in the words uttered ten years after the end of the war, heidegger himself managed to offer an alternative to fascism so as to confront the threats of modern technology. ii. the concept of earth: preliminary remarks on heidegger’s romanticism many of martin heidegger’s works, such works as “the origin of the work of art,” or “the question concerning technology,” are filled with a romanticization of german country life that remains implicitly related (at least it is hard to argue otherwise) to heidegger’s involvement with nazism. and yet, this supposed romanticization does not result from a mere ideological preference, but rather, is grounded in the very concept of a homeland (heimat) or a home ground (heimatlicher boden) consequently employed in heidegger’s “gelassenheit” (n.b. both of these concepts approximately correspond to what in “the origin of the work of art” he refers to as ‘the earth’).4 heidegger concludes through his phenomenological explication of the work of art that the essence of the work is the strife between earth and world, and that “[w]hat thus happens in the strife […is] the inauguration of the open in the struggle between the unconcealed and the concealed, the coming-out of hiding and deception—this self-contained event is the happening of what we call truth.”5 the making of a work of art produces the earth, comparable to the sound in music, the words in literature or color in the visual arts. nonetheless, we cannot reduce the earth to such isolated concepts as ‘matter’ or ‘the sensuous’ since heidegger conceives of it as the opaque aspect of beings, which resists being brought to the clearing of intelligibility. in opposition to the earth, the world is that which is opened by the work. earth and world, then, describe two different dimensions of intelligibility: the opaque, or that which resists interpretation (concealment), and the world as “revealing,” or the transparent aspect of entities. art as “the becoming and happening of truth”6 manifests then when the earth—as that which closes upon itself—becomes brought to the open of the world in the strife instigated by the work; that is, in the tensional relationship established between what there already is and the elusive aspect of the receding earth. 3 martin heidegger, discourse on thinking.: a translation of gelassenheit, (new york, harper & row, 1959) 4 iain d. thomson, heidegger, art, and postmodernity, (cambridge: cambridge university press, 2012), 110 5 martin heidegger, “vom ursprung des kunstwerks: erste ausarbeitung” heidegger studies vol. 5 (1989): 5-22. the original text reads: “was so in der bestreitung geschieht: die eröffnung der offenheit des widerstreits von unverborgenem und verborgenem, das herauskommen von verdeckung und verstellung, — dieses in sich gefügte geschehen ist das geschehen dessen, was wir wahrheit nennen.” 6 martin heidegger, poetry, language, thought. (new york: harper & row, 1971), 71. 58 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college despite the alleged ontological complexity of heidegger’s concept of ‘earth,’ he still can claim that, “[w]e notice that a work of art has flowered in the ground of our homeland. as we hold this simple fact in mind, we cannot help [but remember that] at once […] during the last two centuries great poets and thinkers have been brought forth from the swabian land. thinking about it further makes clear at once that central germany is likewise such a land, and so are east prussia, silesia, and bohemia.”7 given these statements, it seems like we must concede to ihde that heidegger’s romantic tastes are intrinsically linked to his nationalist ideology and represent a great obstacle not only for the philosophy of technology, but also for his aesthetics (including his concept of truth). nonetheless, this pivot too hurriedly dismisses heidegger’s thought, which can be corrected if we approach his critique of modern technology from the horizon of his remaining corpus. as stated earlier, heidegger claims that the essence of the work of art takes place in strife, which itself hosts the occurrence of truth as unconcealment. in “the question concerning technology,” the essence of technology as enframing (gestell) is characterized as modernity’s hegemonic mode of unconcealing. in this way, art and technology are revealed as diametrically opposed modes of unconcealment or truth, and as ihde points out—concerning the latter—heidegger has the tendency to oppose a ‘good’ technology to a ‘bad’ one. what characterizes the good technology is its artistic dimension as a result from art not yet being distinguished in its particularity from the rest of technology, as is the case in greek philosophy—where the concept of techné is understood as encompassing the poiesis of fine arts since the artist is not distinguished from the artisan. yet, ihde understands that heidegger’s distinction has its grounds in subjective preferences; in particular, a nostalgia for traditional modes of production and an ecological awareness that rejects those technologies that “provoke” (herausfordern) nature. in “gelassenheit”, heidegger claims that in order to face the threats that modern technology poses, “[w]e can use technical devices as they ought to be used.”8 phenomenology (methodologically speaking) precludes this type of normative claims because it must be descriptive. although we might conclude that in this speech heidegger betrays his arbitrariness by uttering explicitly normative claims, there are still, nonetheless, many sufficient arguments to doubt this deduction. in the next section, i initially expound heidegger’s characterization of the provocative mode of unconcealing as derived from a more original one, and secondly, offer an interpretation of heidegger’s project in “gelassenheit” that emphasizes the non-normative grounds of his statements. in both of these cases, the original/derived distinction grounds heidegger’s preferences. these must be understood as stemming from a purely phenomenological basis that does not allow itself to be tainted by subjective tastes or a normativity incompatible with the phenomenological method. 7 martin heidegger, discourse on thinking.: a translation of gelassenheit, (new york, harper & row, 1959), 47. 8 ibid, 54. 59issue vii ◆ spring 2020 art, technology, and truth iii. beyond romanticism: the transcendental artwork in the “question concerning technology,” after a brief detour through the traditional conception of technology as a means to an end, and a reinterpretation of aristotle’s concept of causality, heidegger formulates the essence of technology as the gestell, or “enframing”. the gestell marks one of the epochs in heidegger’s depiction of the history of western metaphysics, which just as the idea was for plato, is the way in which being announces itself to us in our times. what characterizes our epoch is that the gestell interpellates us to unconceal the totality of beings as “stock” (bestand) in the manner of a provocative order or solicitation (herausfondernde bestellen).9 discerning what exactly heidegger considers to be the particular characteristics and limits that enable us to distinguish the provocative mode of unconcealment from non-provocative ones represents a tough exegetical challenge. why exactly does the hydroelectrical dam on the rhine provoke nature whereas the temple does not? in this respect, ihde opposes heidegger’s description of the greek temple in the “origin of the work of art” to that which j. donald hughes offers in his ecology in ancient civilizations. while heidegger offers a highly romanticized depiction of the temple, hughes emphasizes the environmental impact that one can see around the acropolis. hughes also mentions how even plato witnessed these concerning ecological transformations when he visited various temples devoted to the guardian spirits of streams, which had already dried out by his time. nonetheless, these counterexamples suffer from two defects. first, the contrast between these examples results from heidegger’s stance that we must understand the work of art in the context of the world that is opened up by it. it is then justified to offer a romanticized depiction of the temple since only in this way can we offer an account of its original situation in which the temple properly functions as a work of art. the two examples offered by hughes depict works whose worlds have already closed. second, we must concede to ihde that hughes’ examples demonstrate how the damage done to nature is not something exclusive to modern technology. however, this does not mean that greek technology provoked nature in a heideggerian sense. what concerns heidegger is the complete hegemony of a certain way of approaching beings that threatens to take over all other possible modes of unconcealment. we must take into account that even if the ancient greeks could be said to have damaged nature just as much as the english did in the times of francis bacon, the difference between the two of them— and of unique interest to heidegger—is how from a certain historical horizon nature can be seen as something to be dominated, which is clearly incompatible with the greek conception of physis.10 9 martin heidegger, vorträge und aufsätze, (frankfurt am main: vittorio klostermann, 2000), 17. 10 in more analytical terms, the distinction is not quantitative but qualitative. it does not refer to a measurable difference in ecological damage but rather to a change in humanity’s relation to nature. the type of comparison that ihde makes rests in the type of thinking that heidegger is criticizing, that is, the calculative mode of thought that hopes to settle all questions by way of empirical obervations and measurements. 60 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college the ultimate danger that the gestell represents is that all modes of unconcealment would be redirected to that of provocation. this would signify the end of meditative thinking and the total hegemony of what heidegger terms the calculative mode of thought. heidegger claims that the gestell, which becomes pervasively evident in our times with the advent of such technologies as the nuclear bomb, began operating and developing itself long ago—being the root of modern science’s instrumental character and understanding of nature in terms of measurable extension. in this way, heidegger worries that the only possibility that would remain for man would be “of pursuing and pushing forward nothing but what is revealed in ordering (bestellen), and of deriving all his standards on this basis. through this the other possibility is blocked, that man might be admitted more and sooner and ever more primally to the essence of that which is unconcealed and to its unconcealment, in order that he might experience as his essence his needed belonging to revealing.”11 in the language of being and time, man would fall into an improper mode of existence in which he would no longer understand himself from himself, and, remain oblivious to his own essence as a consequence of understanding both nature and himself in terms of stock (bestand). ihde admits that “heidegger does not simply outright condemn modern technology—its essence, enframing, is simultaneously a revealing of the world and an openness.” in spite of this, ihde dismisses the danger that heidegger warms us of by introducing the following question: “in short, all of nature, including the human being, will be seen as reduced to a vast resource well (bestand) – but the question then is: for who, or for what end?”12 however, if we properly understand heidegger’s stance that the gestell grounds an epoch of our understanding of beings, then it does not result from any human will or in favor of any human interests. in this respect, heidegger’s stance regarding the hegemony of the gestell can be compared to michel foucault’s description of power relations. instead of the traditional models of power vested in a source of authority, an individual figure or within a particular group, the microphysics of power do not respond to any such central source; instead, oppressed individuals reproduce within themselves these same structures biopolitically.13 the following quote from heidegger’s “gelassenheit,” thus, takes on the following relevance: “these forces, since man has not made them, have moved long since beyond his will and have outgrown his capacity for decision[s].”14 another aspect of heidegger’s romanticism remains in his nationalism as a form of the concept of ‘home ground,’ which specifically protrudes in “gelassenheit.” in relation to art, heidegger asks “does not the flourishing of any genuine work depend upon its roots in a native soil? […] does man still dwell calmly between heaven and earth? […] is there still a life-giving home-land in whose ground man may stand 11 martin heidegger, the question concerning technology, and other essays, (new york, harper perennial, 2013): 26. 12 don ihde, heidegger’s technologies: postphenomenological perspectives. (new york, fordham university press, 2010), 81. 13 michel foucault, discipline and punish, (new york: vintage books, 1995), 26. 14 martin heidegger, discourse on thinking.: a translation of gelassenheit, (new york, harper & row, 1959), 51. 61issue vii ◆ spring 2020 art, technology, and truth rooted, that is, be autochthonic?”15 these concepts lend themselves easily to an interpretation that relates heidegger’s thought immediately back to his involvement with nazism, but this issue is far more complex. the concept of earth is the result of a phenomenology of the work of art and his phenomenology—as is the case for the phenomenology of “equipment” towards the beginning of being and time, which focuses exclusively on the artisanal mode of production—takes the thematic entity under description from the perspective of a primitive experience. in this way, we can say that heidegger’s phenomenology of art, although seeking to arrive at the essence of art as such, focuses on a model of art in which the production of beautiful objects is not yet distinguished in its particularity from the rest of technological production. in this manner, there seems to be a radical difference between the greek temple as studied in the “origin of the work of art” and the example of van gogh’s painting “a pair of shoes” offered in that very same text. while the essence of the work of art as strife must be descriptive of all forms of art, it seems that the greek temple is limited to the world of the greeks, whereas van gogh’s painting properly reveals to heidegger the essence of art as such. iain thomson claims that “in van gogh’s painting—the strange space which surrounds these shoes like an underlying and yet also enveloping atmosphere—one can notice that inchoate forms begin to emerge from the background but never quite take a firm shape; in fact, these shapes tend to disappear when one tries to pin them down.”16 in this manner, van gogh’s painting can be said to reflect the structure of the type of strife that heidegger deems the essence of the work of art. meyer schapiro famously objected to heidegger’s interpretation of van gogh’s painting as nothing but a subjective projection of his own romantic preferences, since the shoes that the painting depicted were van gogh’s own—those of a city man, and not, as he states, those of a countrywoman. most heideggerians would claim that schapiro misses the important aspects of heidegger’s example; namely, the ontological depth sought in the phenomenological description of the work. while i partially agree with this rebuke, the fact that van gogh painted his own shoes17 acquires utmost importance precisely because it means that we are facing an ontological work that reflects on its own being—a transcendental art18 that reveals 15 martin heidegger, discourse on thinking.: a translation of gelassenheit, (new york, harper & row, 1959), 47-48. 16 thomson, iain d., "heidegger’s aesthetics", the stanford encyclopedia of philosophy (fall 2019 edition), edward n. zalta (ed.), url = <https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2019/entries/heidegger-aesthetics/>. 17 van gogh’s painting then doesn’t reveal the world of the country woman but the world of the artist. here we have an opposition between the two modes of reading the concept of earth. if we take the shoes to be those of the german country woman, we read the earth as soil (in a way reminiscent of the nazi slogan “blood and soil”) whereas if we take them to be the artist’s, we are confronted with the concept of earth as that dimension of inteligibility that resists totalitarian closure. i’d venture to claim that van gogh’s painting could only reveal art’s essence to heidegger in so far as it expresses the artist’s relationship to the earth which involves a constantly renewed attempt to seize those fleeting instants that are worthy of being immortalized in the artwork. derrida seems to be pointing in this direction on of spirit: heidegger and the question and also on the truth in painting. 18 there is much to develop and further enquire in regard to this concept since the reflexive character of modern art is an extensive phenomenon. i recently came upon a book by literary critic robert alter named “partial magic: the novel as a self-conscious genre,” which sees in the quixote not only the birth of the novel, but also the archetype that contains all the self-reflexive exercises that later novelists will explore and exploit (with the 62 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college the conditions of its own possibility. this kind of art differs altogether from what one could deem pre-transcendental art, such as the greek temple, or any other work of art previous to cervantes’ revolution in putting forth his highly reflective don quixote—comparable to that started in philosophy twenty years later by descartes in his rules for the direction of the mind.19 we can say, without departing too much from heidegger, that a work of pre-transcendental art is a sensible manifestation of the spirit of a community or, in less hegelian terms, that it consolidates its ethnopolitical identity by providing a tangible foundation for its political organization. nonetheless, we can only claim that this is art’s function because of heidegger’s radical claim that the temple founds the greek world in the sense of a cosmovision, opening the historical horizon of intelligibility for their understanding of beings. as heidegger says, “standing there, the temple first gives to things their look, and to men their outlook on themselves.”20 while the temple’s essence is the strife in which the earth is brought to the clearing of human intelligibility, van gogh’s painting reflects the strife itself, as his broad brushstrokes abandon the defined lines of realism and evoke the elusive and receding aspect of the earth. in this way, we can appreciate the link between heidegger’s aesthetics and nationalism, since as long as an explicit distinction between transcendental and pre-transcendental art does not arise, the concept of ‘earth’ remains tied to that of a ‘home ground’ and autochthony. heidegger’s “gelassenheit” functions as an exhortation for thinking about a new autochthony that would allow us to dwell properly in the midst of the irreversible changes brought through modern technology. releasement (gellasenheit) is the attitude that heidegger proposes as that which we need to assume in order to face the threats of modern technology. in “the experience of technology: human-machine relations,” ihde states that “there is a 'technosphere' within which we do a good deal of our living, surrounding us in part the way technological artifacts do literally for astronauts and deep sea investigators.”21 despite his romanticism, heidegger similarly observes that, “[f ]or all of us, the arrangements, devices, and machinery of technology are to a greater or lesser extent indispensable. it would be foolish to attack technology blindly. it would be shortsighted to condemn it as the work of the devil. we depend on technical devices.”22 given that we depend on the world of technology or the technosphere, releasement means saying “yes” to modern technology, remembering, however, that exception of those who subscribe to literary realism). furthermore, an interesting dialogue can be opened with danto’s philosophy of art since his periodization of the history of art responds to the degree of self-consciousness evidenced by artists. danto distinguishes between pre-art and art, the latter corresponding to the epoch in which artists as the makers of beautiful objects are distinguished from artisans. the infamous claim of the end of art precisely refers to the epoch in history, the 20th century, where art itself becomes philosophical as it explicitly poses the question, “what is art?" 19 we could also mention here another exponent of the spanish renaissance: the painter velazquez, known for his self-portrait las meninas and his extensive depiction of mirrors. 20 martin heidegger, off the beaten track, (cambridge, cambridge university press, 2002), 21. 21 ihde, d. technics and praxis, (dordrecht, d. reidel pub. co., 1979), 14. 22 martin heidegger, discourse on thinking.: a translation of gelassenheit, (new york, harper & row, 1959), 53. 63issue vii ◆ spring 2020 art, technology, and truth the essence of modern technology insofar as it compels us to understand nature merely as a quantitatively measurable reserve of resources (including what we deem the “human resources”) threatens to redirect all modes of unconcealment to that of provocation. since this would signify a fall into an improper mode of existence as we stop reflecting upon ourselves to understand humanity merely in terms of stock, releasement simultaneously has to say “no” to the pervasiveness of the gestell: “we can affirm the unavoidable use of technical devices, and also deny them the right to dominate us, and so to warp, confuse, and lay waste our nature.”23 this saying yes to the unavoidable character of technology acknowledges that “a profound change is taking place in man's relation to nature and to the world. but the meaning that reigns in this change remains obscure.”24 given this opacity in modern technology’s essence, the openness to mystery becomes the other part to heidegger’s solution to face the dangers of the gestell. with this openness, heidegger simultaneously recognizes the imperative to accept the inevitable while humbly admitting that his limitations as a man of a past generation preclude him from imagining how man can dwell properly in the time of the gestell. insofar as “mystery” is defined by heidegger as that which shows itself at the same time as it conceals itself, the openness to mystery is the way in which we keep meditative or self-reflexive thought alive by staying in the realm of truth as unconcealment. it is worth noting how the mystery to which we remain open evokes the concept of earth, for one of heidegger’s main contributions to philosophy is his stance that humans first and foremost understand the world through the manipulation of tools and the production of works. thus, thought as openness to mystery and art are identified—as in nietzsche’s stance that art is the properly metaphysical activity of man or danto’s claim that the defining trait of 20th century art remains its philosophical character since it explicitly poses the question “what is art?” v. conclusion releasement and openness to mystery “grant us the possibility of dwelling in the world in a totally different way. they promise us a new ground and foundation upon which we can stand and endure in the world of technology without being imperiled by it. releasement toward things and openness to the mystery grants us a vision of a new autochthony, which someday even might be fit to recapture the old and now rapidly disappearing autochthony in a changed form.”25 the lost rooting that heidegger denounces is not simply the subordination of meditative thinking to calculative thought: the hegemony of modern technology brings about the shortening of all distances in space and time, the erasure of all localisms as a result of globalization. as ihde claims, “[t]he dramatic space shots of earth from the moon or a satellite are very un-heideggerian precisely because they place earth at a distance 23 martin heidegger, discourse on thinking: a translation of gelassenheit, (new york, harper & row, 1959), 54.. 24 ibid, pg. 55. 25 ibid. 64 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college from earth-as-ground. but they are also irreversibly part of the postmodern view of earth-as-globe, with a very different sense of what constitutes our ‘home’.”26 as this essay demonstrated, heidegger recognizes this irreversible aspect of the profound changes in humanity’s relation to nature and the world and exhorts us to think so that we can build a “home” in the technical world. in this regard, heidegger’s thought is closer than ever to the spirit of kant’s philosophy: not only does he offer a critique of the illegitimate claims of the science of his time that threaten to warp and destroy human freedom, but he also calls upon us to understand our dwelling within the world in cosmopolitan terms. ◆ bibliography blok, josine h. “gentrifying genealogy: on the genesis of the athenian autochthony myth.” in ancient myth. media, transformations and senseconstructions, 251–75. edited by ueli dill and christine walde. berlin: de gruyter, 2009. foucault, michel. discipline and punish. new york: vintage books, 1995. ihde, d. heidegger’s technologies: postphenomenological perspectives. new york: fordham university press, 2010. ihde, d. technics and praxis. dordrecht: d. reidel pub. co., 1979. heidegger, m. discourse on thinking.: a translation of gelassenheit. john m. anderson and e. hans freund, trans. new york: harper & row, 1959. heidegger, m. off the beaten track. cambridge: cambridge university press, 2002 heidegger, m. poetry, language, thought. a. hofstadter, trans. new york: harper & row, 1971. heidegger, m. “vom ursprung des kunstwerks: erste ausarbeitung”. heidegger studies vol. 5 (1989); 5-22 heidegger, m. vorträge und aufsätze. frankfurt am main: vittorio klostermann, 2000. heidegger, m. the question concerning technology, and other essays. new york: harper perennial, 2013. thomas, iain d., “heidegger’s aesthetics,” the stanford encyclopedia of philosophy (fall 2019 edition). edward n. zalta (e.d.), url=<https://plato.stanford.edu/ archives/fall2019/entries/heidegger-aesthetics>. thomson, iain d. heidegger, art, and postmodernity. cambridge: cambridge university press, 2012. 26 don ihde. heidegger’s technologies: postphenomenological perspectives, (new york, fordham university press, 2010): 85. 32 δι αν οι α praxis of the soviet avant-garde leah hasdan in the dialectic of enlightenment, max horkheimer and theodor adorno discuss how the culture industry is backed by a noncommittal vagueness of ideology, which, in turn, influences the production of art. horkheimer and adorno argue that, like the culture industry1, art is bound to its struggle with tradition and is unable to transcend a new reality—or give way to a new cultural identity. the authors look towards autonomous art, recognized in the presentation of the avant-garde, to transcend the milieu of the culture industry. yet, as they argue, “the claims of art are always also ideology”2—this holds especially true for avant-garde art. even in the midst of society’s attempting to sever itself from tradition (in hopes of striving for a new identity), avant-garde art does not transcend reality, for it is nonetheless backed by the instrumentalization of ideology and places the artist’s identity into crisis. art is understood as the presentation of truth claims that reveal the current condition of the social order. horkheimer and adorno argue that art is able to transcend reality when it breaks from its tradition or its style; however, style is shaped by tradition, 1 “the culture industry has abolished the rubbish of former times by imposing its own perfection, by prohibiting and domesticating dilettantism, while itself incessantly commiting the blunders without which the elevated style cannot be conceived” adorno, theodor w, max horkheimer, and gunzelin schmid noerr. 2009. dialectic of enlightenment. 1st ed. stanford, calif: stanford univ. press. 108. 2 adorno, theodor w, max horkheimer, and gunzelin schmid noerr. 2009. dialectic of enlightenment. 1st ed. stanford, calif: stanford univ. press. 103. 33issue v f spring 2018 praxis of the soviet avant-garde and a work of art can only break from its tradition when it has developed a new style. in order for a work of art to develop a new style—to break from tradition and transcend reality—it must expose itself to the failures of culture. yet, if a work of art does not expose itself to the “necessary failure of the passionate striving for identity” that marks the discrepancy between tradition and style, then the work of art reverts to immanence, relying on its similarity to others, which marks, for horkheimer and adorno, the “surrogate of identity.” if art fails to diverge3 from its style, then it submits to the “obedience of the social hierarchy.”4 if art is the presentation of truth claims that expose the condition of the social order, then it is always ideology if it does not contest the social hierarchy. therefore, good art, determined by “what the expressionists and dadaists attacked in their polemics, the untruth of style as such,”5 is that which contests its own cultural identity. in order for art to challenge its identity, or break from its tradition, it calls for artists to develop their own style. the greatest artists, then, according to horkheimer and adorno, are “those who adopted style as a rigor to set against the chaotic expression of suffering, as a negative truth.”6 a good artist is one who indirectly communicates suffering by means of inducing a pleasurable, moving experience. an artist with good style indirectly develops his style by means of contesting the guise, absence, or lack of presentation, of suffering. therefore, in the realization of his style, developed out of the artwork itself, the artist does not obey the social hierarchy, but always challenges its claim to truth. in this notion, we recognize revolution. the soviet avant-garde movement is one of the best examples of artists’ demanding a change in the social hierarchy and producing work that embodies the experience of suffering. the newly revolutionized soviet state, however, invariantly politicized the artistic avant-garde movement of its time: it enforced the ideology of the revolution—through a scientific method of organization at its forefront—where the venerated reality of the revolution remained trapped by the instrumentalization of its own ideology. for the constructivist movement in particular, this meant abandoning all a priori conceptions and iconographical elements to investigate the metaphysical contradiction between building materials. the constructivists sought harmony in the least amount of excess necessary for construction. perhaps this is best recognized in aleksandr rodchenko’s oval hanging construction no. 12 (1920), which was constructed out of a single sheet of plywood. this deductive structure was then coated with aluminum, cut into various 3 although the authors use “divulge” in the initial text to argue that the culture industry exposes style as conformity, “[the culture industry] being nothing other than style, it divulges style’s secret: obedience to the social hierarchy,” they are really stressing that style must break from culture if art is to transcend reality (adorno, horkheimer and schmid noerr 2009). 4 adorno, theodor w, max horkheimer, and gunzelin schmid noerr. 2009. dialectic of enlightenment. 1st ed. stanford, calif: stanford univ. press.103-104. 5 adorno, horkheimer and schmid noerr 2009 6 adorno, horkheimer and schmid noerr 2009 34 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college concentric geometric shapes, and positioned in such a manner to form a geometric three-dimensional volume that would plicate into its original planar condition. the oval hanging construction demonstrated a pedagogical directness by showcasing its bare process of production. this method of construction implements a dialectical approach to the integrity of the materials by posing a contradiction to the identity of the transient art object: the construction, or the art object, therefore operates as a motivated sign, whereby its composition is arbitrarily limited by its relationship to its materials. whereas a composition is merely arbitrary, the constructivist’s art objects are motivated by its integrity of material, and by the least amount of excess necessary for its construction.7 operating as a motivated sign, the constructions ultimately stress the discontinuities in temporal and spatial elements of experience, also introducing the artist’s work as an intervention towards the social practice of mass cultural representation.8 yet, this intervention of mass cultural representation is precisely what is at stake here. the constructivist’s pedagogical directness did not contest mass cultural representation; rather, they used it as a means to re-constitute a collective identity. mediating the transcendence of a new identity by embodying the power of mass cultural representation, the constructivists dismissed the authentic experience of the viewer, which establishes the validity of the art object. the constructivist’s logical method of production induces an absence or loss of experience for the viewer, such that the artist imposes a manufactured reality onto the art object—leaving no room for the viewer to authentically reflect and establish a connection to the art object. the loss of experience, according to adorno, occurs when ideology or preconceived, a priori concepts mediate the essential moment of objectivity. the essential moment of objectivity occurs when the object or thing-in-itself is not falsified by mediated concepts; the object must be experienced for what it is as intention recta9, and must “prove itself in that it qualitatively alters the opinions of reified consciousness.”10 the viewer’s loss of experience is recognized in the oval hanging construction’s discontinuities in temporal and spatial elements of experience. the oval hanging construction denies the possibility of an essential moment of objectivity because it cannot disentangle its temporal and spatial elements of experience from the ideological framework in which its very form and materiality are constituted. therefore, the oval hanging construction cannot be considered a thing-in-itself outside of its ideological framework. as such, the oval hanging construction is arbitrarily limited as a motivated sign. in its demonstration of the least amount of 7 foster, hal. art since 1900: modernism, antimodernism, postmodernism. 2nd ed. vol. 184. 8 foster, hal. art since 1900: modernism, antimodernism, postmodernism. 2nd ed. vol. 1. new york: thames & hudson, 2004. print. 183. 9 the state of consciousness which focuses upon the true object, rather than on an image of the object within the intellect. 10 adorno, theodor wiesengrund, henry w pickford, and lydia goehr. 1998. critical models. 1st ed. new york: columbia university press. 252. 35issue v f spring 2018 praxis of the soviet avant-garde excess of materials, the oval hanging construction holds captive the experiential reality of production by staying true to its representation of efficiency. the viewer’s experience of the deductive materiality in the oval hanging construction is entirely mediated by the motivation—the interjection of ideology on behalf of the artist. presenting its ability to be reverted into its original planar condition, the thing-initself is robbed of its essential moment of objectivity, for it is only suggestive of a fixed manufactured experience and cannot be recognized as such—as its true object. yet what guides the residual notion of objectivity it not necessarily the thing-in-itself, but rather something man-made entirely: [i]t is the model of the profit that remains on the balance sheet after all production costs have been deducted. profit, however, is subjective interest limited and reduced to the form of calculation. what counts for the sober matter-of-factness of profit thinking is anything but the matter: it disappears into the return it yields.11 the subjective viewer’s interest towards the art object reflects what is common to the community and its forms of visibility, thereby marking the residual notion of objectivity within the capitalist framework. the basic level of production suggests that subjective interest does not recite quantifiable value, whereas in a heightened sense of production (induced by the capitalism system), subjective interest obtains a relationship to the quantifiable value of the profit-gain return model. the quantifiable abstract value inherent to capitalism demands the subject to regard the world with an interest that is fundamentally quantitative. something may be valued, such as the oval hanging construction, the viewer’s experience is in fact mediated by the capitalist profit-thinking: fundamentally quantitative mentality. it is not so much that the viewer looks towards the art object as a literal form of quantifiable value; rather, it is that the viewer enters an organized method of social programming—that of the capitalist regime—where he forfeits the spontaneity of his or her own contemplation for the sake of a quantifiable, tangible operation of contemplation where “ideology […] makes life initially easier for the spectators.”12 in the same sense that the art object is trapped by the predetermined framework of its own ideology, the experience of the art object as such is set up in advance to determine the viewer’s experiences as nothing but the culture industry’s object, which is to view the art object as a cyclical invariant of the production.13 in this sense, the loss of experience is predicated on the notion of “the ideal of depersonalizing knowledge 11 adorno, theodor wiesengrund, henry w pickford, and lydia goehr. 1998. critical models. 1st ed. new york: columbia university press. 253. 12 adorno, theodor w, max horkheimer, and gunzelin schmid noerr. 2009. dialectic of enlightenment. 1st ed. stanford, calif: stanford univ. press. 117. 13 adorno, theodor w, max horkheimer, and gunzelin schmid noerr. 2009. dialectic of enlightenment. 1st ed. stanford, calif: stanford univ. press. 113. 36 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college for the sake of objectivity.”14 the loss of experience occurs when ideology determines thinking for us. when the essential moment of objectivity for the construction falls prey to mediated a priori concepts, the separation between theory and praxis emerges in the loss of experience and knowledge. perhaps the constructivists developed a new style at best. if reinforcing ideology by giving it aesthetic form can been regarded as style, then their art objects alluded to the idealized transparency of the political state. it is clear that rodchenko’s oval hanging construction presents theory in operation: his construction lays bare the process of production and calls the experience of efficiency into question for the viewer. however, if thinking is a form of doing; and theory is a form of praxis,15 then is the articulation of theory successful here? both the art object and the viewer exist within a revolutionary moment of passionate striving for a new cultural identity. if the construction is a motivated sign, does the oval hanging construction confront challenges of production? the failure to do so strikes the revolutionary moment as incomplete, for the viewer enters the artistic space in search for a direction, anticipating an answer to the revolutionary call. yet the viewer operates under the profit-thinking model that renders them docile, forfeiting the spontaneity of their own contemplation for the ideology presented before them. the articulation of theory is quite relevant here, for if the viewer is confronted with a ready-made cliché defined by the cultural schema within which it operates, then to what extent does cliché answer the revolutionary call by suspending a sense of reflection within the viewer? does theory carry out its goal in the oval hanging construction if the construction reinforces the hierarchical representation of production rather than posit a form of alterity? the constructivists’ pedagogical directness demonstrates a loss of experience that is necessary to prologue the revolutionary fervor for both artist and viewer. the revolutionary experience sparks the guiding ideology of the revolution is extinguished when every phase of artistic production and choice of material is planned. this loss of revolutionary experience isolates theory from its praxis by collapsing the distinction between the artwork and its message: what since then has been called the problem of praxis and today culminates in the question of the relation between theory and praxis coincides with the loss of experience caused by the rationality of the eternally same. where experience is blocked or altogether absent, praxis is damaged and therefore longed for, distorted, and desperately overvalued. thus what is called the 14 adorno, theodor wiesengrund, henry w pickford, and lydia goehr. 1998. critical models. 1st ed. new york: columbia university press. 253. 15 “a consciousness of theory and praxis must be produced that neither divides the two such that theory becomes powerless and praxis becomes arbitrary […] thinking is a doing, theory a form of praxis.” adorno, theodor wiesengrund, henry w pickford, and lydia goehr. 1998. critical models. 1st ed. new york: columbia university press. 261. 37issue v f spring 2018 praxis of the soviet avant-garde problem of praxis is interwoven with the problem of knowledge. abstract subjectivity, in which the process of rationalization terminates, strictly speaking can do just as little as the transcendental subject can conceivably have precisely what it is attested to have: spontaneity.16 what induces the artist’s disconnect from the spontaneity of the revolutionary experience is his preconceived commitment to the artistic material, precisely because the construction is a motivated sign, where the form of the art object communicates a truth limited in its interpretation. the art objects obey the social hierarchy by presenting truth claims that have been manufactured by the politicization of the state. the separation of theory from praxis is most evident in vladimir tatlin’s monument to the third international (1920). originally crafted in wood within a scale of 18 to 22 feet, the finished monument was intended to be a 1300-foot metal-and-glass sculpture (which, at the time, would have surpassed the world’s tallest building [the eiffel tower] by one third) that aimed to embody the new ethos of the revolution. tatlin’s celebrated design consisted in two dovetailing conical spirals contained within a web of oblique and vertical slats, which framed four geometric glass volumes stacked on top of each other within the structure’s slanted core. the four glass volumes were intended to rotate at specific paces—each representing a branch of the comintern, or the soviet organization in charge of spreading the revolution abroad. the revolution regarded with the slowest pace was the largest volume, symbolizing the international’s “legislative assemblies,” intended to rotate for the length of a year. the second volume would house the executive branch and rotate for a month; the next volume, the propaganda services, would take a day; the uppermost volume was added as a late edition to the project and would have presumably lasted an hour.17 a construction built off of the cyclical rigid invariants developed out of the social disorder of the revolution, tatlin’s art object presents a harmony that was guaranteed in advance. intended to rebel against the cultural complacency left over from the monarchical tradition, the material form of tatlin’s construction quite literally obeys its own hierarchy in the new soviet order. although there were several arguments made in favor of the production, tatlin’s design was never realized. he failed to justify his formal use of a spiral, and its appeal to an age-old iconography, reducing his construction to a cultural, traditional invariant of the same. the working group of objective analysis, established by rodchenko, regarded tatlin’s monument as a fetishization of artistic production—a romantic affair: “by a lone artist in the secrecy of his studio and with the traditional tools of his craft; its formal organization 16 adorno, theodor wiesengrund, henry w pickford, and lydia goehr. 1998. critical models. 1st ed. new york: columbia university press. 260. 17 foster et. al 2004 p.183 38 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college remained an indecipherable secret that reeked of ‘bourgeois individualism’: it was not a construction but an authorial composition.” 18 through his logical method of production, tatlin isolated himself, as well as his work, from the constructivist community precisely because he was detached from the theory of the revolutionary fervor. the unembroidered material representation of the soviet social hierarchy in the monument to the third international destroys any opportunity for the essential moment of objectivity because the construct cannot be viewed as anything other than its literal representation. the absence of spontaneity in tatlin’s artistic processes, the concrete memorialization of a suffering void of actually inducing a moving, reflective experience for the viewer, demonstrates his inability to articulate theory and therefore isolates praxis altogether. the absence—or loss—of an experience that may stimulate reflection and generate knowledge, rooted in the complacency of profit-thinking, constitutes the artist’s failure to incite an authentic connection with his work: “the lack of self-reflection […] is the mark of a praxis that, having become its own fetish, becomes a barricade to its own goal.”19 in the attempt to respond to the call of the revolutionary fervor— to strive for a new cultural identity—the constructivist movement organized its revolutionary theory within the efficiency of production. initially emerging out of the platform of autonomous art, the constructivist movement should have challenged itself, contested the social order, and promoted a social alterity. since it failed to stay true to its roots, it did not produce works of art that challenged themselves or instigated spontaneous reflection necessary to carry out its own goal. the art object should not answer a call to what should be done, but present an aesthetic experience that gives space for critique. though the constructivist movement did not succeed in its autonomous intent, such failure does not exist because of theory’s failure to prescribe praxis. the distinction between theory and praxis does not suggest a temporal continuity: “the relationship between theory and practice after both have once distanced themselves from each other is that of qualitative reversal, not transition, and surely not subordination.” 20the disenchantment of the constructivist movement is due to the loss of identity on behalf of the artist. trapped by the constraints of ideology, the soviet avant-garde artist did not successfully critique his tradition, and therefore lacked a presentation of style such that it ultimately failed to induce an aesthetic experience that would promote the passionate striving for an alterity, or a new cultural identity. 18 foster, hal. art since 1900: modernism, antimodernism, postmodernism. 2nd ed. vol. 1. new york: thames & hudson, 2004. print. 182. 19 adorno, theodor wiesengrund, henry w pickford, and lydia goehr. 1998. critical models. 1st ed. new york: columbia university press. 262. 20 adorno, theodor wiesengrund, henry w pickford, and lydia goehr. 1998. critical models. 1st ed. new york: columbia university press. 277. 39issue v f spring 2018 praxis of the soviet avant-garde theodor adorno specifies that successful action arises out of engaging in the art of critique. addressing the oscillation between theory and praxis yields the spontaneity of imagination, which presents the possibility for change. in this respect, adorno believes that art should be autonomous. insofar as art compels change through the dialectical approach of critique, “art is the critique of praxis as unfreedom; this is where the truth begins.”21 moreover, adorno mentions that praxis embodies a sincere and intense conviction, which is broken when praxis liberates itself out from the interplay between the sensuous and the rational movements of the intellect, which are expressed in friedrich schiller’s play drive. 22 it is true, nonetheless, that schiller proposes if man were to achieve change successfully, then “he will have to approach it through the problem of the aesthetic, because it is only through beauty that man makes his way to freedom.” 23 in order for theory and praxis to succeed—for the interplay between the sensuous and rational to remain in balance—the artist must induce an aesthetic experience, which would stimulate the inherent reflection—the spontaneity of imagination necessary for change. because the free play of the imagination mimics the intellect’s capacity to conceive of a political alterity, schiller calls for a historically situated intellectual reflection. this is what makes schiller’s system attractive to adorno: the fact that schiller diagnoses his historical moment, and attributes its corrective task to an aesthetic experience, incites freedom’s capacity to keep itself in check through the active interplay of the imagination. the dialectical procedure of the aesthetic experience, developed out of the sensual, instigates the imagination to posit an alterity that may then be grounded and articulated in a reasonable local manner that tailors the current condition of the social order. schiller’s system offers a similar operation of theory and praxis in the sense that freedom induced by reflection is not removed from its actual practice: rather, it opens up a space to critique, to preserve intention, and to give way to a proper form of practical freedom. what remains of interest here is that schiller emphasizes a critique of the historical moment, where his response to the revolutionary call stands in accordance with an aesthetic self-reflection, and where the viewer is able to generate knowledge and earnestly partake in a form of praxis. in respect to soviet avant-garde art, praxis was isolated from theory when the artist produced constructions that preserved the soviet identity by trapping representation in material form, as opposed to producing works of art aimed at inciting spontaneous reflection—which would develop a space for critique and the production of knowledge. 21 adorno, theodor wiesengrund, henry w pickford, and lydia goehr. 1998. critical models. 1st ed. new york: columbia university press. 262. 22 adorno, theodor wiesengrund, henry w pickford, and lydia goehr. 1998. critical models. 1st ed. new york: columbia university press. 262. 23 schiller, friedrich von, walter hinderer, and daniel o dahlstrom. 2005. essays. new york: continuum. 90. 40 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college it is as if the soviet artist conceived of himself as a mere agent of ideology, solving the historical moment through its preservation, executed via efficient assembly. what is there to be said about the lack of self-reflection, perhaps on the part of the artist, in the ever-changing contextual moment? we may come to recognize that the transparency of the artist’s pedagogical directness reveals a silencing on the artist’s part—sacrificing the identity of his own narrative to present the logic of collective assembly. yet, in the historical moment of striving for a new identity, the logical method of organization lays bare the complacency of profit-thinking where the artist is only valued based on the efficiency of his assembly. the soviet artist cannot but help face isolation as he anticipates losing true value in his commitment to rigid ideology: …in the eyes of those who nourished the all too abstract and illusory hope for a total transformation might have appeared justified—that is, violence—after the experience of the national socialist and stalinist atrocities and in the face of the longevity of totalitarian repression is inextricably imbricated in what needs to be transformed […] whoever does not make the transition to irrational and brutal violence sees himself forced into the vicinity of the reformism that for its part shares the guilt for perpetuation the deplorable totality […] dialectic is perverted into sophistry as soon as it focuses pragmatically on the next step, beyond which the knowledge of the totality has long since moved.24 although the constructivist movement may be read as a call for order in the lingering moment of revolutionary fervor, the crisp delineation of geometric lines erects borders around empty space, which operate as mere frames that hug an unknown, undefined territory. if the art objects of the constructivist movement were to bear meaning outside of their initial ideology, they would be seen as memorials to the insecure struggle, and collective loss of identity. in his logical presentation of material, the soviet artist bears witness to the violent nihilism of constructing value out of mechanical assembly. insofar as theory is a form of praxis (“if thinking bears on anything of importance, then it initiates a practical impulse, no matter how hidden that impulse may remain to thinking” 25), then the artistic vision and its aesthetic experience are also productive. schiller believes that the practical impulse in the artistic process depends on the artist’s handling of the subject matter—specifically that the artist obtains the power to manipulate form so that it may destroy and consume material. the more seductive the material appears in itself, “the more it seeks to impose itself upon us, the more high-handedly it thrusts itself forward with effects of its own.”26 artistic production, according to schiller, carries with it the capacity to transform, destroy, 24 adorno, theodor wiesengrund, henry w pickford, and lydia goehr. 1998. critical models. 1st ed. new york: columbia university press. 268. 25 adorno, theodor wiesengrund, henry w pickford, and lydia goehr. 1998. critical models. 1st ed. new york: columbia university press. 264. 26 schiller, friedrich von, walter hinderer, and daniel o dahlstrom. 2005. essays. new york: continuum.151. 41issue v f spring 2018 praxis of the soviet avant-garde and give shape to materials based on our susceptibility to its sensuousness. this process of production is precisely how the working group of objective analysis constituted tatlin’s romantic affair in the secrecy of his own studio: “in contrast with the bourgeois artist’s studio secrets, the sculpture’s ‘logical’ mode of production and deductive structure where heralded as a means of opposing the fetishization of artistic production.”27 however, the logical mode of production lacks the susceptibility to sensuous materiality present in schiller’s system, and the aesthetic experience altogether. the material appears sensuous through artistic production: the artist realizes his artistic vision through the process of destroying material—of giving it form. through this process of creation, the art object appears sensual because it serves as a vestige of this artistic consciousness. the viewer seduced by the sensuousness of material because artistic production has rendered it as a presentation of the artists’ consciousness: the material now embodies an inductive experience that validates the existential existence of the viewer. it is the viewer’s experience of recognizing the power of the gaze that reflects the violence of artistic production back to itself. the viewer is receptive to the art object’s raw material. with the power of the art object’s gaze, the viewer must destroy its aesthetic organization, for reflection causes the viewer to examine and dissect forms of detail, dismantling the visual. however, adorno mentions that the soviet artist, through his violence—in enforcing the pragmatic direction of reformism and in moments where constructivist art merely reverts to industry of pedagogical directness—creates an impositional alterity that severs their art from its autonomous roots. a manufactured experience that links alterity with a dependency on ideology, “a work of art, which expresses intelligence more than anything else, can never strike us as noble, any more than it is beautiful, since it emphasizes a relation of dependence (which is inseparable from purposefulness) instead of concealing it.”28 f 27 foster, hal. art since 1900: modernism, antimodernism, postmodernism. 2nd ed. vol. 1. new york: thames & hudson, 2004. print. 184. 28 schiller, friedrich von, walter hinderer, and daniel o dahlstrom. 2005. essays. new york: continuum. 155. 42 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college bibliography adorno, theodor w, max horkheimer, and gunzelin schmid noerr. 2009. dialectic of enlightenment. 1st ed. stanford, calif: stanford univ. press. adorno, theodor wiesengrund, henry w pickford, and lydia goehr. 1998. critical models. 1st ed. new york: columbia university press. foster, hal. art since 1900: modernism, antimodernism, postmodernism. 2nd ed. vol. 1. new york: thames & hudson, 2004. print. schiller, friedrich von, walter hinderer, and daniel o dahlstrom. 2005. essays. new york: continuum. 5issue x ◆ spring 2023 δι ά νο ιαdear reader, april 26th, 2023i am pleased to present issue x of dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college. we received around one hundred and !fty excellent submissions from six countries and three continents. "e essays presented in this issue were selected by the editorial board after four rounds of reading, discussion, and selection. "ey represent not only the hard work of our authors, but also the e#ort we on the editorial board have taken to share with you, our reader, what we found to be the !ve most compelling and astute pieces. in terms of content, we believe this issue has a little bit of something for everyone. "e works published range from a rigorous close reading of aristotle to an investigation into joannes althusius, an obscure, yet compelling natural law theorist. we hope you take the time to read through these exciting pieces and that they edify you in your personal philosophical pursuits. additionally, we are privileged to publish an interview with gregory fried, phd., professor of philosophy at boston college, on his most recent book towards a polemical ethics: between heidegger and plato. he o#ers some relevant and timely insights not only on the contempory philosophical predicament but also on the process of philosophy in general. "ank you to patrick kelly, the incoming editor in chief, for reading dr. fried's book conducting this interview. "is year, the editorial board chose jean-baptiste regnault's !e origin of sculpture as the cover art for this issue. "e painting depicts a scene from the myth of pygmalian when pygmalian prays to venus to animate his statue with which he had fallen in love. we believe it evokes the philosophical discipline in that, just as pygmalian saught the help of the gods to bring his creation to life, good philosophy is vivi!ed by earnest engagement with philosophers past. on the release of this tenth issue of dianoia, i cannot help but to pause and express my sincere gratitude for all who made this possible. most of all, i would like to thank peter klapes, one of the founders of this journal. his constant support and invaluable advice truly made the publication of this issue possible. i would also like to thank patrick, jake, and greg, the mangaing editors, and the rest of the editorial board. sincerely, tanner d. loper editor-in chief dianoia a l et t er f r o m t h e ed it o r 15issue vii ◆ spring 2020 δι αν οι α virtue, silencing, and perception1 abhi ruparelia over the course of several influential articles, philosopher john mcdowell describes the practical reasoning of the virtuous agent using an appeal to his distinctive perceptual abilities.2 mcdowell argues that when such an agent deliberates about a course of action, he never sees any conflict between the demands of virtue and other competing non-virtuous considerations, because for him, the requirements of virtue silence the other competing reasons for action. this conception of “silencing” greatly puzzles modern scholars and has in recent years generated a vast amount of literature on the subject.3 while the idea itself seems to be aimed at providing an understanding of aristotle’s account of virtue in the nicomachean ethics (hereafter referred to as the ethics), mcdowell offers a novel characterization in that he takes virtue to be some sort of superior perceptual capacity. therefore, the aim of this essay is to critically analyze the notion of “silencing” as a condition or requirement for attaining virtue. to achieve this, i begin by briefly laying out aristotle’s description of virtue in the ethics. second, i reconstruct mcdowell’s understanding of virtue and 1 i would like to thank nancy schauber, karin boxer, will reckner, geoff goddu, javier hidalgo, and jackson leviness for their helpful comments and insights on earlier versions of this paper. 2 mcdowell “are moral requirements hypothetical imperatives?” (1978), “virtue and reason” (1979), “the role of eudaimonia in aristotle’s ethics” (1980). 3 kieran setiya “is efficiency a vice?” (2005), susan stark “virtue and emotion” (2001), jeffrey seidman “two sides of silencing” (2005), karen stohr “moral cacophony: when continence is a virtue” (2003), anne margaret baxley “the price of virtue” (2007), denise vigani “virtuous construal: in defense of silencing” (2019), neil sinhababu “virtue, desire, and silencing reasons” (2016), r jay wallace “virtue, reason, and principle” (1991), garrett cullity “the context-undermining of practical reasons” (2013), sarah broadie “ethics with aristotle” (1993), attila tanyi “silencing desires” (2012), simon blackburn “ruling passions: a theory of practical reasoning” (2001), and charles starkey “on the category of moral perception” (2006), among others. 16 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college what he takes to be the virtuous agent’s decision-making process. third, i provide two interpretations of this “silencing” ability that have gained popularity in recent literature. finally, i argue that neither interpretation is satisfactory because they (i) leave gaps in understanding the virtuous agent’s decision-making process, and (ii) go against the nature and the description of virtue as laid out in the ethics. aristotle on virtue in book vii of the ethics, aristotle begins by laying out the four following character types: continence, virtue, incontinence, and vice.4 continence and virtue are generally regarded as good and praiseworthy, but the former is less admirable than the latter. similarly, incontinence and vice are considered to be base and blameworthy, but the former is less so than the latter. for our purposes, we are primarily concerned with virtue and continence. in the ethics, aristotle distinguishes between the virtues of thought and the virtues of character. he considers the virtue of character to be some type of disposition resulting from habituation. he thinks that such a virtue does not arise in us naturally; rather, we are, by nature, able to acquire it.5 he further claims that we, as humans, already possess the capacity to become virtuous; however, in order to actualize this capacity, we need to activate our virtues. he explains this process of “activation” using the example of crafts (e.g. in order to become a skilled painter, we need to activate this skill by practicing painting habitually). similarly, in order to become brave or just, we need to start by performing brave or just actions.6 in book ii, aristotle provides us with what appears to be a definition of virtue: virtue, then, is a state that decides, consisting in a mean, the mean relative to us, which is defined by reference to reason, that is to say, to the reason by reference to which the prudent person would define it.7 this definition points to two important characteristics about the nature of virtue: 1) for aristotle, virtue represents a mean between two extremes, one of excess and the other of deficiency. take, for instance, the virtue of courage. this virtue straddles a middle ground between recklessness (excess) and cowardice (deficiency). 2) for aristotle, there is an important connection between prudence and virtue. that is, he takes prudence to involve some sort of deliberation in accord with reason, and based on this, understands virtue as the state involving correct reasons where correct reasons are those in accordance with prudence.8 4 nicomachean ethics book vii, 1145a15-1145b20; in addition to these, aristotle also considers heroic or divine virtue as a condition of character. however, such a virtue is primarily attributed to gods. hence, it is beyond the scope of this paper. 5 ibid, book ii – 1103a15-1103b25. 6 ibid, book ii – 1103a15-1103b25. 7 ibid, book ii -1107a1-5. 8 ibid, book vi – 114b20-30. 17issue vii ◆ spring 2020 virtue, silencing, and perception the case of continence is slightly more complicated than virtue. the continent person is similar to the virtuous person in that he always chooses and performs the actions in accordance with rationality and reason. nonetheless, such a person possesses base appetites and is often tempted by them (and pained by their deprivation), but chooses not to give in. in other words, the continent person is someone who performs virtuous actions, but who finds them difficult, or has to struggle with competing inclinations.9 in contrast, the virtuous person acts with ease and without a need to overcome competing inclinations. furthermore, the continent person stands in opposition to the incontinent person, who, because of the weakness of his will, proceeds to give in to his base desires. such a person’s will is overpowered by his desires, causing him to act against reason.10 again, it is important to remember here that while the continent person acts in the same manner as the virtuous agent, the fact that he allows himself to be tempted by competing considerations suggests that he is, in some sense, morally deficient. mcdowell’s conception of virtue mcdowell is primarily concerned with what constitutes a virtuous agent and separates him from the incontinent or the merely continent person. since these are also the questions that aristotle mainly concerns himself with in the ethics, mcdowell follows in aristotle’s footsteps by beginning with the socratic thesis that equates virtue with knowledge and uses it as a base to develop a more sophisticated account of virtue. he first considers the case of the non-virtuous agent as the incontinent person, and then moves on to the non-virtuous agent as the continent person.11 for mcdowell, virtue is a sort of perceptual capacity. he thinks that there is a fundamental difference between the perceptions of the virtuous agent and the merely continent/incontinent agent. this difference is primarily what separates the virtuous person from the other two, and largely accounts for his nature. mcdowell’s discussion on virtue as a type of knowledge is dependent upon his characterization of the latter as an ability to “get things right.”12 what he means by this is the ability to anticipate the needs/expectations of the situation and to act accordingly, which he calls “reliable sensitivity.”13 he further introduces the concept of “deliverances” of the reliable sensitivity and says that “[deliverances of reliable 9 ibid, book vii – 1151a30-115b20. 10 ibid, book vii – 1151b21-1152a5. 11 when referring to the “non-virtuous” agent, mcdowell appears to be pointing solely at the incontinent and the continent agents. this goes against aristotle, who takes the continent, the incontinent, and the vicious person to be non-virtuous. hence, it is not entirely clear, based on his paper, why mcdowell does not understand the vicious agent to be non-virtuous. perhaps one possible explanation might be that he does not consider the vicious person a moral agent at all (which is consistent with aristotle), and hence ineligible for his discussion on agency and virtue. 12 mcdowell “virtue and reason,” pg. 331. 13 ibid, pg. 331-32. 18 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college sensitivity] are cases of knowledge; and there are idioms according to which the sensitivity itself can approximately be described as knowledge.”14 by these lines, mcdowell appears to suggest that the virtuous agent subscribes to some version of moral particularism, in that he understands the needs of a situation as dependent upon his perception of it rather than his deductive application of codifiable moral principles.15 he uses the example of a kind person to explain this, who knows what it is like to face a situation that requires him to be kind, independent of any reasons or justification for acting kindly. in this sense, such a sensitivity is a type of perceptual capacity.16 yet, mcdowell notes an apparent problem in equating this perceptual knowledge with virtue:17 a non-virtuous person’s perception of a situation appears to match precisely the perception of a virtuous agent, yet, the former does not act in the same way as the latter. as he rightly notes:18 but if a perception which corresponds to the virtuous person’s does not call forth a virtuous action from this non-virtuous person, then the virtuous person’s matching perception – the deliverance of his sensitivity – cannot, after all, fully account for the virtuous action which it does elicit from him.19 this problem leads mcdowell to think that there is something that he seems to be missing in his analysis of the virtuous person. part of this gap left by the problem above is addressed by aristotle, who argues that the reason why the non-virtuous incontinent agent does not act in the same manner as the virtuous agent is because the former is affected by akrasia, or ‘weakness of will’. while ideally the perception of a non-virtuous (incontinent, in this particular case) and a virtuous agent should be the same, in reality, the incontinent agent’s perception is “clouded” or “unfocussed” by a “desire to act otherwise.”20 to understand this notion better, compare an akratic agent with someone suffering from a cataract. a cataract patient’s vision will be clouded, in the literal sense of the word, causing difficulties in viewing everyday objects and situations that would otherwise be clearly visible to the normal eye. similar to this, the akratic agent also suffers, metaphorically, from a type of moral cataract, preventing him from identifying or choosing the right choice in a given situation. this account of akrasia works well for mcdowell because it fills the gap left in the previous paragraph by treating the perception of an 14 ibid, pg. 332. 15 nancy sherman’s “aristotle's ethics: critical essays” (pg. 11). 16 mcdowell “virtue and reason,” pg. 332. 17 ibid, pg. 333. 18 implicit within this problem is aristotle’s view that perceptual sensitivity is motivation enough for an agent to act upon this sensitivity. see ne 1147a20-35. 19 mcdowell “virtue and reason,” pg. 333. 20 ibid, pg. 334. 19issue vii ◆ spring 2020 virtue, silencing, and perception incontinent agent as different from the virtuous agent. this “difference” results from the incontinent person’s failure to act virtuously because of the “defectiveness” in his reliable sensitivity (where this defect is a direct outcome of his akratic nature). having discussed the case of the non-virtuous incontinent agent, mcdowell moves on to the non-virtuous continent agent. he rightly notes that for aristotle, continence is distinct from virtue, but just as problematic as incontinence. this problematic nature arises because if someone needs to deliberate and to overcome a temptation to act otherwise, in a situation that demands of him that he act according to, say, temperance or courage, then he is simply continent, and not virtuous. on its face, it seems like a trivial difference; after all, why should the fact that the agent deliberated about a decision (or that he was tempted by a non-virtuous consideration), before going on to choose the right consideration, make him any less virtuous? mcdowell claims that this question stems from a misunderstanding of the nature of virtue. that is, if we are to understand that the virtuous agent arrives at his judgment as to what he should do by weighing the right and the wrong reasons for action, and ultimately favoring the right one, the difference between continence and virtue becomes nonexistent. consequently, we should not understand the virtuous agent’s ability to make decisions as a weighing of reasons.21 but if that is true, how, then, are we supposed to make sense of the decision-making process of a virtuous agent? the truly virtuous agent, mcdowell argues, does not override or outweigh the reasons to act contrary to his reliable sensitivity, but silences them.22 this notion of silencing, and its difference from overriding or outweighing, is of great importance to mcdowell’s characterization of virtue. what exactly does this idea of silencing mean is a topic to be discussed in detail in the next section. for now, we are left with an important question: “how can one have a view of a situation in which considerations which would otherwise appeal to one’s will are silenced, but nevertheless allow those considerations to make themselves heard by one’s will?”23 in response, mcdowell resoundingly claims that one cannot view a situation in which non-virtuous considerations are silenced, and yet, are simultaneously heard by one’s will. this demonstrates that it is wrong to think of the continent person as fully sharing the virtuous person’s perception of a situation. what is silencing? we now come to the most important part of the paper, namely the act of silencing itself. there are two standard interpretations of the act of silencing in contemporary literature: rational silencing and motivational silencing.24 as far as rational silencing 21 ibid, pg. 332. 22 ibid, pg. 332. 23 ibid, pg. 335. 24 note that this dual-aspect interpretation is not mcdowell’s own. rather, the interpretation is credited to jeffrey seidman (2005), who understands mcdowell’s account as involving two different versions of the act of silencing. 20 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college goes, it can largely be explained in cognitive terms, and deals with an agent’s beliefs about action in accordance with reason. textual support in mcdowell for this type of silencing is as follows: [t]he relevant [ethical] reasons for acting, on occasions when they coexist with considerations that on their own would be reasons for acting otherwise, as, not overriding, but silencing those other considerations—as bringing it about that, in the circumstances, they are not reasons at all.25 i interpret these lines to mean that when a virtuous person is faced with the choice between different moral considerations, there are two possible ways in which he can perceive a situation: a) the non-virtuous considerations are silenced such that they stop being reasons for acting at all; therefore, such non-virtuous considerations stop being considerations (morally speaking, that is) at all and b) the competing nonvirtuous considerations are moral considerations, as far as the agent is concerned; nonetheless, they are so implausible, in that they go against the virtuous nature of the agent, that his will silences them and he never takes such considerations seriously— let alone chooses them. under the type-a view of rational silencing, since the competing non-virtuous considerations are silenced, they stop being moral considerations. as a result, what the agent sees before him are some sort of non-moral considerations that exclude the need for application of normative principles. hence, they will be irrelevant or meaningless to the agent, at least insofar as the situation at hand requires of him to make a moral judgement. to understand the latter view of rational silencing, it might be helpful to compare silencing with gary watson’s distinction between mere desires and the desires that we value.26 take, for instance, watson’s example of the mother who has a sudden urge to drown her bawling child in the bath. this is a mere desire that the mother does not value. hence, such a desire is not even taken seriously by the mother. take, on the other hand, my desire to excel in my classes in order to become a better philosopher. this is an end that i truly and sincerely value. hence, if we approach the type-b version of rational silencing from the lens of desiring and valuing, it becomes clear that the virtuous agent’s will silences the non-virtuous considerations such that the agent does not really value a consideration that goes against his virtuous nature.27 all in all, the virtuous agent acting under both types of rational silencing will take himself to suffer no genuine losses in foregoing non-virtuous considerations.28 25 mcdowell, “the role of eudaimonia in aristotle’s ethics,” p. 102. 26 watson (1975), “free agency.” 27 ibid. 28 there is, however, an exception to this – the so-called “tragic cases,” where the agent has no other acceptable course of action available; seidman pg. 70. 21issue vii ◆ spring 2020 virtue, silencing, and perception the second type of silencing, known as motivational silencing, entails that if a nonvirtuous consideration is motivationally silenced by an agent’s will, the agent will not be tempted to perform the wrong action. it is, however, not the case that the virtuous person would not like or obtain pleasure from the considerations that he does not choose. to explain this further, mcdowell uses the example of a man who is faced with the dilemma of whether or not to sleep with his friend’s wife.29 here, it is not the case that the virtuous person’s libido will be undemanding or that he will not enjoy the act of sleeping with someone. on the contrary, the virtuous agent is just as human as the next person. in fact, under the right circumstances, he would happily indulge in an act of sexual gratification available to him. however, in the current situation, “his clear perception of the requirement [of virtue] insulates the prospective enjoyment… here and now, it [prospective enjoyment] does not count for him as any reason for acting in that way.”30 both types of silencing, according to seidman, go hand-in-hand for mcdowell. that is, owing to the fact that there are no genuine losses on the part of the virtuous agent in failing to choose the non-virtuous reasons under rational silencing, none of the agent’s motivational energies are enticed in favor of non-virtuous considerations under motivational silencing. objections and responses my first objection to mcdowell’s argument (and seidman’s interpretation in turn) is concerned with the way in which the two types of rational silencing function in relation to the virtuous agent’s perception. i shall address the type-b rational silencing first: if we are to understand the type-b rational silencing as the difference between merely desiring an end, and valuing that end, we run into conceptual problems about the notion of silencing in general. that is, the very process of valuing an end over merely desiring it involves the process of deliberation on the part of the virtuous agent, such that he assigns a higher degree of importance to the end he values, compared to the end he desires. if we are to understand this practice as “silencing,” such a practice turns out to be pretty similar to the act of overriding or outweighing reasons. hence, under the value versus desire model, the difference between silencing and overriding is not entirely clear. therefore, the type-b rational silencing is unsatisfactory. under the first type (i.e. competing non-virtuous considerations stop being moral considerations), if we are to accept rational silencing as construed, then we cannot praise the virtuous person for making the right choice competing non-virtuous considerations will not appear to the agent of type-a rational silencing as considerations at all (but even if they do, they will be meaningless to him). hence, the only “choice” that the agent’s perception comes across, is the virtuous one. strictly speaking, then, 29 mcdowell, “are moral requirements hypothetical imperatives?” pg. 27. 30 ibid, pg. 27. 22 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college the agent does not actually perform the act of choosing. in making such a claim, i take it for granted that choice, or being able to choose, requires there to be more than one consideration available to the agent. indeed, the way that choice is intuitively understood, it involves some sort of decision-making on the part of the agent. and for the process of decision-making to work, competing options must exist so as to account for such a process. as a result, if the virtuous agent’s perception views only one option as the potential course of action, he does not actually choose – rather, he accepts the given state of affairs as they manifest before him. additionally, it is also not as if the agent could refrain from acting, insofar as refraining constitutes a “choice” for the agent, because both aristotle and mcdowell take the perceptual sensitivity of a virtuous person to be motivational. hence, there can be no situation, barring any physical constraints, where the agent fails to act on the deliverances of his perceptual sensitivity. thus, the agent does not really have a choice other than acting virtuously. to understand my objection better, consider the following analogy: imagine that there are four courses of action available to a virtuous person in making a decision. behind option one, the person sees the action that appears right (virtuous) to him under the particular circumstances; the other three options, however, lead to different (non-virtuous) actions, but cannot seem to be chosen by the virtuous person because those three options cease to exist as potential courses of action. hence, while the person’s will can still acknowledge the presence of these non-virtuous paths, so to speak, his will would not register them as paths.31 consequently, the agent does not even consider them as options because they cannot be acted upon in that particular situation. thus, if the agent is successful in choosing the right option in this manner, it would hardly make sense to attribute to him the highest level of praise, that aristotle and mcdowell confer upon him, for his choice. this is because the right option was not chosen by the agent; rather it was taken for granted by him, as the only manner in which he could act there was literally no other way he could have acted. the situation turns out to be different in case of the continent agent, in that he has a choice – namely the other competing non-virtuous options that he is tempted by, but chooses not to act upon them. as a result, the continent person is considered praiseworthy to the extent that he manages to overcome his inclinations to act otherwise and chooses the virtuous action. now, based on the analogy above, if we are to accept that a virtuous agent making a choice in this manner deserves some, but not such a high degree of, praise, and if one of the primary differences between a virtuous agent and a merely continent 31 the difference between acknowledging something and registering it is slight, but important, nonetheless. i can acknowledge the presence of a human figure walking towards me from a mile away, but it is only after it comes closer that my brain can register it as john. analogously, the virtuous agent may perhaps acknowledge the existence of non-virtuous considerations – he might know that they exist – but he surely does not know what they are. and in the absence of such crucial information, he may lack the appropriate resources to act upon them. 23issue vii ◆ spring 2020 virtue, silencing, and perception agent is the level of admiration that each receives then, it follows that there is no real difference between the virtuous and the continent agent as far as praise goes. a potential counter-argument to my objection stems from the view that it is not the act of choosing one of the four options that one praises in a virtuous agent; instead, it is the ability of his perception to create a situation where non-virtuous options cease to be options at all. furthermore, since this ability is achieved through the process of rigorous training, habituation, and transforming oneself from being merely continent to virtuous, it follows that this training is what turns out to be actually praiseworthy. in response, i argue that if we are to praise the agent for his disposition – the hard work he put into becoming virtuous – we are latching on to his past achievements. these achievements, while significant, are nonetheless irrelevant to the situation in question. indeed, would it not seem counterintuitive to hold on to the one (and potentially the only) achievement someone has ever had (in this case, training), and to keep on praising them for a lifetime for simply acting in accordance with their training? perhaps one may respond here that it does not seem so counterintuitive; after all, we regularly praise olympic swimmers and chess grandmasters for their training, and regard it perfectly appropriate to do so. but such a response misses its mark because the training involved here is not in the right sense—being able to act morally is not akin to being able to hold one’s breath underwater for several minutes. perhaps my point about the counter-intuitiveness of the scenario can be better understood with an example: if you witnessed our virtuous agent saving a child from drowning, would you rather praise him for his present actions, or for the hundreds of hours he spent in studying aristotle and learning to become virtuous (not to mention his upbringing), that eventually led him to save the child? the former seems far more likely. owing to these concerns, i find mcdowell’s conception of rational silencing unsatisfactory. my second objection, directed at motivational silencing, is concerned with how mcdowell and seidman characterize the virtuous agent: mcdowell’s standards for virtue—the ability to not get tempted by competing considerations and to silence them—are too high and too stringent for ordinary human beings to uphold. as mentioned earlier, mcdowell’s account of the virtuous agent is mainly inspired by aristotle’s account in the ethics. there, however, aristotle advertises virtue as something that can be acquired by a normal moral agent though habituation. mcdowell’s agent, on the other hand, appears to be some sort of super-human because his ability to silence is truly incredible. as seidman rightly notes, it is one thing to argue that a virtuous agent does not take himself to have a good reason to sleep with a friend’s wife; however, it is another thing to claim that such a person does not even think of such a possibility.32 32 seidman, pg. 76. 24 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college returning to our discussion of the virtuous person as a type of ‘superhuman,’ take, for instance, the slightly more obvious case of facing the enemy in a war. seeing as the enemy is at the gates, you, the courageous soldier, march forward to the battlefield despite knowing that you are heavily outnumbered and unlikely to succeed. in this case, going by mcdowell’s characterization, the idea of fleeing from the battle would not even occur to you. in fact, the thought of not seeing your family or loved ones ever again does not bother you, even for a second, in the face of duty. is the virtuous agent, then, so righteous and perfect that the idea of performing a non-virtuous action never occurs to him? does such a man only dream chaste dreams? as it stands, only full-fledged asceticism seems to fulfill the requirements of such a virtue. how can we then expect a normal individual to attain such a high level of moral piousness? simon blackburn rightly echoes these claims in ruling passions. he says: the elements of the virtue tradition that ... [should] be jettisoned are those that rhapsodize over the special nature supposedly belonging to virtuous persons, such as their special immunity to temptation, or the way in which their virtue 'silences' all their other dispositions. for it seems to turn out that this god-like nature belongs to nobody, and represents an ideal to which nobody can approximate.33 quite plausibly, then, mcdowell’s standards for virtue are unreasonably high. this, however, is not to say that it is impossible for a normal individual to possess the ability of motivational silencing. in some, albeit very narrow cases, individuals do exhibit such a capacity. take a politician campaigning for an office. if this person is reasonably sane, the idea of having his opponents killed does not even occur to him. similarly, in my desperate attempt to win the cricket match, the idea of smashing the head of the opposite team’s bowler does not even occur to me. in this sense, the politician and i exhibit motivational silencing and are not tempted by the competing considerations of murder and assault. nonetheless, there is a very narrow spectrum of cases where individuals exhibit such a behavior. to expect them to exhibit such a capacity in all their decisions, throughout their lives, would surely be asking too much of them. it is simply not how normal individuals think. hence, mcdowell’s conception of motivational silencing also turns out to be unsatisfactory. neither interpretation of silencing turns out to be satisfactory because both of them leave several gaps in our understanding of virtue and go against the description of virtue as propounded by aristotle in the ethics. ◆ 33 s blackburn, ruling passions, pg. 37. 25issue vii ◆ spring 2020 virtue, silencing, and perception bibliography aristotle. nicomachean ethics. translated by terence irwin. 2nd ed. indianapolis, in: hackett publishing company, inc., 2019. blackburn, simon. ruling passions: a theory of practical reasoning. oxford: clarendon press, 2009. mcdowell, john, and i. g. mcfetridge. “are moral requirements hypothetical imperatives?” aristotelian society supplementary volume 52, no. 1 (september 1978): 13–42. mcdowell, john. “virtue and reason.” monist 62, no. 3 (1979): 331–50. mcdowell, john. "the role of eudaimonia in aristotle's ethics." in essays on aristotle's ethics, edited by amélie rorty, 359-76. oakland, ca: university of california press, 1980. seidman, jeffrey. “two sides of silencing.” the philosophical quarterly 55, no. 218 (2005): 68–77. sherman, nancy, ed. aristotle’s ethics: critical essays. lanham, md: rowman & littlefield, 1999. watson, gary. "free agency." in agency and answerability: selected essays, 13-32. oxford: clarendon press, 2004. 6 δι αν οι α spinoza the hindu: advaita interpretations of the ethics noah forslund dutch philosopher baruch spinoza holds a distinctive, if enigmatic, place in the western philosophical canon. although usually considered as a cartesian rationalist, spinoza’s metaphysical and epistemological views continue to be considered somewhat anomalous within the occidental tradition.1 arguably, in fact, much of his influential ethics espouses a substantively non-“western” philosophical doctrine beneath orthodox rationalist terminology and organization. i contend that, although it employs decidedly western-rationalist methods of inquiry, the ethics actually proposes a system strikingly similar to the ontological-philosophical worldview found in advaita vedanta hinduism. core similarities between the schools include their (1) non-dualist, monistic metaphysical systems, (2) a strong relationship between humans and the divine, and (3) a potential for living liberation. this paper will consist of comparative analyses of metaphysical and epistemological facets of both the advaita and spinozistic philosophical traditions, including overviews of both schools, and concluding with a suggestion that these similarities might prompt a reexamination and critique of the oft-cited east-west dichotomy. it may first be relevant to define briefly the binary system alluded to previously. the east-west dichotomy comprises a doctrine that divides socio-cultural, religious, 1 russell, bertrand. a history of western philosophy. (london: allen & unwin, 1946), 458-461. 7issue v f spring 2018 spinoza the hindu and philosophical, traditions into two distinct camps, which are understood to inhabit fundamentally different realms. customarily specified hallmarks of western philosophy include a propensity towards rational intellectualization, the promotion of individualism, a rejection of mysticism, and often metaphysically, some conception of a personal god. common stereotypes of eastern philosophies include a skepticism toward pure rationalism and the intellect, mystical doctrines, and non-personal deities. spinoza has perennially been placed firmly within the former canon2; an examination of the substance of his works, however, might complicate this placement. although some antecedent scholarship has compared spinozism to eastern philosophical traditions, most analyses have been restricted to broad comparative surveys of buddhism and spinozism. in the past, researchers have provided several examinations that attempt to link the two philosophical schools. s.m. melamed associates spinoza’s advocacy of a seemingly impersonal, or even non-existent, god to the buddhist metaphysical picture of an “empty” universe.3 both b. ziporyn and soraj hongladarom cite spinoza’s union of mind and corporeal body as correlative to the buddhist doctrine of non-self.4 5 although some limited scholarship exists in this particular area of comparative analysis, few publications—if any—have considered comparisons between spinozism and advaita vedanta hinduism. the lack of literature regarding this similarity is surprising. in the next few paragraphs, i will broadly outline the two traditions individually, in order to procure, eventually, an examination of their similarities and differences. we will begin with an overview of advaita vedanta philosophy. first espoused by sankara in the 9th century ce, the tradition is rooted in interpretations of the brahma sutra, the bhagavad gita, and the upanishads, three core hindu religiophilosophical texts. advaita is characterized by the fundamental belief that ultimate reality is solely brahman: that existence cannot be reduced to various distinct entities (like an individual soul, or an external world). advaita vedanta thus promotes a non-dualist, monist6 model of reality, in which all the world is a manifestation of the singularity of brahman (the word advaita literally means “non-dual” 7). additionally, brahman is infinite, and transcends the existence of the world. although the world is 2 russell, western philosophy, 459. 3 melamed, s.m. spinoza and buddha: visions of a dead god. (chicago: university of chicago press, 1933), 153-275. 4 ziporyn, b. (2012). spinoza and the self-overcoming of solipsism. comparative and continental philosophy, 4(1), 125. 5 hongladarom, soraj. “spinoza & buddhism on the self.” the oxford philosopher, july 29, 2015. 6 it must be acknowledged, however, that the characterization of advaita as a strictly “monist” philosophy has been cited as problematic by many adherents, scholars, and philosophers; anantanand rambachan writes, “numerical categories, such as the number one, gain meaning from the existence of other numbers. when reality is nondual, we are constrained to use such categories with caution.” (rambachan, advaita worldview, 67) haphazardly ascribing a numerical category to brahman might be seen as an attempt to limit the illimitable. although we must be careful with complications that arise from such terminology, semantics aside, the ontological picture proposed in advaita remains a non-dual, unified reality in brahman. 7 brannigan, michael c. the pulse of wisdom: the philosophies of india, china, and japan. (stamford: wadsworth/ thomson learning, 2000), 61. 8 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college “non-different (ananya) from brahman [...] brahman is not identical with the world.” 8 in other words, although the world derives its existence and reality from brahman, the inverse is not true, because “the reality of brahman is independent and original.” 9 advaita scholars and philosophers consistently assert that brahman’s limitlessness (ananta) renders any attempt at descriptive language ineffective. for this reason, brahman’s true being is portrayed in advaita as nirguna, or without characteristics. this contrasts with a portrayal of brahman as saguna, which signifies that explicit attributes are assigned. the concept of nirguna brahman requires that ultimate reality only be described negatively, as neti, neti (“not this, not this”).10 because brahman is infinite, linguistically assigning any qualities to it would only serve to limit its nature. thus, brahman must remain ineffable. because all the world is essentially non-different from brahman, humans too are only manifestations of the divine. the cardinal assertion in the advaita tradition is tat tvam asi: that the human self (atman) is non-different from brahman. this is further exemplative of non-dualism in advaita. individual selfhood is illusory, based upon a flawed understanding of ultimate reality. as long as the world (including the self ) is perceived ordinarily (as distinct from brahman), a human remains in a state of ignorance (avidya). avidya obstructs us from the highest quest for humanity: knowledge of our true selves and reality as identical to brahman.11 ultimate liberation, called moksha, is achieved when a person realizes that atman is non-different from brahman. one prominent advaita scholar neatly summarizes the concept of liberation, writing that “the unliberated person attributes a separate reality to the world, while the liberated sees the world as owing its existence and being to brahman.” 12 moksha affords humanity the valid means of knowledge of ultimate reality, superior to human perception or reason (sankara rejects these alternate sources of knowledge, because they rely on an observed object’s finity). nirguna brahman is without attributes (“form, sound, taste, scent, and sensation”), so the senses cannot hope to provide any understanding of ultimate reality. similarly, although sankara does not discount the importance of human reason (guided by the holy texts, such as the upanishads), he does assert that brahman surpasses any human rational capacities: “although reasoning may be noticed to have finality in some, still in the present context it cannot possibly get immunity from the charge of being inconclusive.” 13 because brahman is both the means of knowledge and knowledge itself (insofar as brahman is ultimate reality), brahman must be known intuitively: “intuitive knowing is immediate as distinct from the discursive and mediate knowledge [...] it is the 8 rambachan, anantanand. the advaita worldview: god, world, and humanity. (albany, ny: state university of new york press, 2006), 75. 9 rambachan, advaita worldview, 77. 10 brannigan, pulse of wisdom, 63. 11 brannigan, pulse of wisdom, 64-65. 12 rambachan, advaita worldview, 113. 13 rambachan, advaita worldview, 49. 9issue v f spring 2018 spinoza the hindu perfect knowledge, while all other knowledge is indirect and imperfect insofar as it does not bring about an identification between subject and object.” 14 when a person has achieved moksha, he is liberated from ignorance through knowledge of all reality as brahman, which results in freedom from “sorrow, hate, grief, greed, and fear [… and] the attainment of peace and abiding happiness.”15 this, very broadly, summarizes the main tenets of the advaita vedanta tradition. allow us now to compare this summary to the normative eastern philosophical model outlined earlier in this paper. to recapitulate, oft-proposed hallmarks of eastern philosophy include: (1) skepticism toward pure rationalism and the intellect, (2) the promotion of mysticism and the possibility of unity with the divine, and (3) a metaphysically non-personal god. although the nuances of advaita philosophy present some variance in practice and belief, we can generally understand the school to include these characteristics. firstly, we have seen sankara’s rejection of human sensory experience and pure reason as sources of valid knowledge: that is, true knowledge of brahman can only be attained through intuitive understanding, guided by hindu holy texts. secondly, human union with brahman through the realization of tat tvam asi is the ultimate goal in advaita philosophy. thus, advaita does promote a sort of mysticism, in which the self may be unified with, and liberated through, the divine. thirdly, brahman is decidedly non-personal. the actions of brahman are unconcerned with human interests or desires. instead, the world merely behaves according to brahman’s essential nature—its grounding of reality. as sankara writes, “god [brahman] can have activities of the nature of mere pastime out of his spontaneity without any extraneous motive [….] any motive imputed to god can have neither the support of reason nor of the vedas.”16 effectually, we see that the advaita vedanta school includes these three normative “hallmarks” of eastern philosophy. now that we have summarized the advaita philosophical tradition, we will continue with an overview of the spinozistic philosophical system found in the ethics. a foundational element of spinoza’s method lies in his argument that god must be the only substance that exists. the core of this spinozistic concept lies in propositions that stem from spinoza’s definition of substance, which he defines as “that which is in itself and is conceived through itself; that is, that the conception of which does not require the conception of another thing from which it has to be formed.”17 a substance is a thing that enjoys autonomous, self-contained existence, the understanding of which is not dependent upon the conception or existence of auxiliary things. although an individual substance can have various affectations or modes within its being, these affectations are necessarily subsidiary to the substance 14 s. radhakrishnan, trans., the principal upanishads. (london: allen & unwin, ltd., 1953), 96. 15 rambachan, advaita worldview, 55. 16 rambachan, advaita worldview, 91. 17 spinoza, baruch. the ethics, treatise on the emendation of the intellect, and selected letters. translated by samuel shirley. edited by seymour feldman. 2nd ed. (cambridge: hackett pub. co., 1992), 31. 10 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college itself. as spinoza writes, “substance is by nature prior to its affectations.” 18 finally, extrapolating on the logic of these propositions, spinoza argues that a substance, by nature, must be infinite (or hold infinite attributes), because the substance must exist independent of the existence of other bodies. nothing can ever constrain a substance (and substances can never constrain each other). it is from this foundational understanding of substance that spinoza derives the claim that “there can be, or be conceived, no other substance but god,” and, that, consequently, “whatever is, is in god, and nothing can be or be conceived without god.”19 because god is a perfect entity, he20 is the only thing that must necessarily exist by definition. therefore, all other things exist subordinately to the existence of god, because he is constrained by nothing. god is the only thing that can be independently self-contained and self-caused, and, thus, fulfills the two defining characteristics of a substance.21 so, all of existence is god. things we perceive to be individual entities actually comprise only finite modes within the substance of god, which is internally infinitely diverse and complex. it is here that spinoza begins to use the terminology “god”, or, “nature”, because god, as all of existence, is equated with the universe and nature itself. thus, spinoza is generally understood to espouse a pantheistic, or a panentheistic-monistic philosophy, in which all existent things are unified in the oneness of god’s eternal, infinite being.22 due to god’s perfection, morality in spinozism is limited to the non-metaphysical, and god is decidedly non-personal. if the universe and god are one and the same, we cannot explain occurrences within nature through human definitions of “good” or “bad.” ultimately, if god is the only substance, and therefore is the only causal power in existence, then all things in him “proceed from an eternal necessity and with supreme perfection.” 23 if all things are divine, then all events are perfect and necessary, insofar as they emanate directly from god. thus, spinoza presents us with an amoral universe, void of any differentiation between metaphysical “good” or “bad.” this ontological schema advances a conception of a non-personal god, unconcerned with human activity or interests. as spinoza writes, “nature has no fixed goal (and) all final causes are but figments of the human imagination [...] god has acted in all things for the sake of himself, and not for the sake of the things to be created.” 24 but where do humans fall in this metaphysical picture? if we are understood to be only finite modes of a non-personal divine entity, what becomes of our relationship 18 spinoza, ethics, 32. 19 spinoza, ethics, 39-40. 20 the masculine pronoun is only used here to conform to spinoza’s own word choice. 21 hartshorne, charles and william l. reese. philosophers speak of god. (amherst, ny: humanity books, 2000), 194. 22 hartshorne, philosophers speak of god, 189-192. 23 spinoza, ethics, 59. 24 spinoza, ethics, 59. 11issue v f spring 2018 spinoza the hindu to the god? it is clear that the human self must be conceived as a part of god. spinoza writes that the self (“man”) consists of the unification of human mind and body, arguing that the mind is the self comprehended under the attribute of thought, while the body is the self comprehended under the attribute of extension. because god is all things, god must therefore have the attributes of thought and extension. the human mind and body are both expressions of god under these different attributes. 25 yet, both objects, unified in the self, remain finite, individual parts of the singular substance that exists beyond them: “we are a part of nature which cannot be conceived of independently of other parts.”26 it is here that spinoza begins his discussion of the three types of human knowledge. the first type is derived from sensory experience, which only offers falsities, due to the subjectivity of the senses. the second is derived from common understandings of the world and its properties, unencumbered by subjectivity: that is, reason. the third and final kind of knowledge, spinoza calls “intuitive,” of which he writes, “proceeds from an adequate idea of the formal essence of certain attributes of god to an adequate knowledge of the essence of things.”27 that is, essentially, intuitive knowledge is derived from an understanding that god is all of existence, and, thus, that the essences of all things are defined by his being. when a person has an adequate conception of god through an understanding of the true nature of reality (that is, spinoza’s pantheistic monism), he simultaneously has a true understanding of all things in existence, because they are one and the same. therefore, intuitive knowledge is “necessarily true”, emanating directly from the necessity of god’s being.28 spinoza believes that humans can ultimately achieve freedom through this intuitive knowledge. through this adequate understanding of god, we may be liberated from the bondage of uncontrollable emotions (or “agitations of the mind”) produced in us by “thoughts of external [non-divine] causes.”29 essentially, spinoza argues, when we understand the ontological necessity of all things resulting directly from god’s being, we can rationalize our way out of undesirable emotional responses. if the actions of an external body produce in us a sensation of fear—or anger, or sadness— intuitive knowledge allows us to realize the divine necessity of those actions, and to rationalize the emotion, negating it through thoughtful reflection. 30 we move from being passive participants in our emotional state to being active participants in that state, through this intellectual process, as we simultaneously achieve salvation from ignorance. therefore, as spinoza writes, the highest blessedness that a human can achieve is found in this intuitive knowledge, which leads to an “intellectual love of 25 spinoza, ethics, 64-72. 26 spinoza, ethics, 156. 27 spinoza, ethics, 90. 28 spinoza, ethics, 91. 29 spinoza, ethics, 204 30 spinoza, ethics, 205-206. 12 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college god”, and, consequently, of all existence.31 spinoza summarizes his liberative system, writing that “the wise man...suffers scarcely any disturbance of spirit, but being conscious, by virtue of a certain eternal necessity, of himself, of god and all things... always possesses true spiritual contentment.” 32 allow us first to compare the spinozistic system to the normative western philosophical model elucidated earlier. the ethics certainly utilizes a western rationalist lexicon and basic conceptual framework. spinozistic terms like substance and attributes had been employed by precursory western philosophers like descartes and malebranche, even if their definitions were slightly different. similarly, the geometrical-method proofs found in the ethics were certainly evident of a penchant for ordered intellectual inquiry. thus, spinoza clearly fulfills that first indication of the western philosophical canon: he proposes his system in western terms, employing a decidedly occidental model. yet, spinoza fails such a litmus test on all other indications. firstly, with his promotion of pantheistic monism, spinoza rejects individualism. because god encompasses all of existence, and because a particular human solely comprises a modal manifestation of the divine, the supposed “individual” must in fact be unified with all other beings in the ultimate ontological picture. in his comparison of spinozistic and buddhist philosophy, soraj hongladarom neatly summarizes this retreat from individualism, writing that “the task of the human being is to achieve what [spinoza] calls ‘the intellectual love of god’ [….] here the uniqueness of this situation does not play a role; instead the idea is to forgo these traits of individuality by merging with the one, so to speak, through losing one’s unique individual traits.” 33 secondly, spinoza espouses a version of philosophical mysticism wholly distinct from the western canon. in the ethics, human endeavors toward an intellectual love of god end with liberation through a realization of ultimate ontological union with god. this, in effect, sounds somewhat like eastern mysticism, and further isolates spinoza from traditional western philosophy. third, as explained earlier, spinoza’s god is decidedly non-personal, unconcerned with human interests; any attribution, of a human-serving “fixed goal,” to nature can only be “but a figment of the human imagination.” 34 while the ethics finds spinoza rejecting many of the hallmarks of western canonical models, the text strikingly parallels advaita philosophy. what will follow will be an analysis of these likenesses. firstly, both spinozism and advaita vedanta hinduism present non-dualist, essentially monistic metaphysical systems. in spinozism, god is the only independent substance 31 spinoza, ethics, 217-221. 32 spinoza, ethics, 223. 33 hongladarom, “spinoza & buddhism”, no page numbers. 34 spinoza, ethics, 59. 13issue v f spring 2018 spinoza the hindu in existence—god alone is infinite, immutable, and eternal. all individual things comprise finite modes of god’s substance, and are identical to god (insofar as they are themselves divine). yet, god, with infinite attributes, transcends all possibilities of human perception; we only have access to god through the attributes of extension and thought, though god contains infinitely more attributes. thus, god is infinitely greater than the observable universe, because god is constrained by nothing, including human faculties. this is strikingly similar to the unified ultimate reality proposed by advaita vedanta. brahman alone comprises all existence as an infinite, eternal being. the world and individual humans are finite expressions of brahman’s nature, and are non-different from brahman. however, the infinite nature of brahman indicates that ultimate reality is not encompassed by the world alone, as brahman can neither be constrained nor defined by any external body. both spinozism and advaita propose monistic, transcendent divine beings, which encompass all of reality and existence, and which exist independently of any subordinate entity. a further metaphysical parallel between spinoza’s god and advaita’s brahman is that both provide the ontological grounding for ultimate reality, but both are nonpersonal. we have seen how spinoza’s god is unconcerned with human interest and desire, merely acting “in all things for the sake of himself,” 35 according to the necessity of god’s nature. similarly, in advaita philosophy, extraneous motives cannot be attributed to brahman; instead, actions like creation are “in the very nature of brahman.”36 both god and brahman are the grounding forces of reality and existence, non-different from both, and defining reality and existence according to the necessities of their own beings. a second similarity can be found in the relationship of humanity to god. in both traditions, humans are manifestations of the divine, non-different from their respective gods. spinoza argues that humans, along with all things in existence, comprise modes of god’s substance. the human self (as it is composed of mind and body) is one with god. advaita philosophy promotes a similar human union with god, since atman is non-different from brahman. thus, both systems present us with a vision of humanity as expressions of god, ultimately inseparable from the divine. the ontological non-dualism of each tradition thus extends to the human self, which is non-distinct from god or brahman. a third and final similarity between the traditions can be found in their promotion of living liberation through knowledge of ultimate reality. in spinozism, an intellectual love of god (intuitive, true knowledge of ultimate reality) is the highest blessedness a human can achieve. in doing so, a person is liberated from an incomplete knowledge of reality and possesses “spiritual contentment” through a recognition of the necessity of god’s nature. a person who has achieved moksha in advaita vedanta is freed from 35 spinoza, ethics, 59. 36 rambachan, advaita worldview, 91. 14 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college ignorance (avidya), anxiety, and anger, and knows “peace and abiding happiness.” the acknowledgement that atman is non-different from brahman is the only source of valid, necessarily true knowledge about existence. in both traditions, humans can be liberated through a realization of the ontological truth of a singularly unified ultimate reality. despite these striking connections between substantive facets of each tradition, some nuanced differences remain. perhaps the principal divergence is seen in the fact that advaita vedanta comprises a religious tradition accepted by a community of believers throughout a significant portion of human history, while spinozism (as presented in the ethics) is decidedly philosophical, devoid of any explicit community of believers, and without any “religious” history. we may observe a product of this difference in advaita philosophy’s emphasis on the importance of hindu religious texts as conduits for human knowledge. spinoza, conversely, proposes no equivalent textual guide for intuitive knowledge of god. instead, humans achieve an intellectual love of god that is guided by reason. spinoza believes that the route to blessedness and true knowledge, although ultimately intuitive, must involve reason and the intellect. thus, rationality serves as a preliminary guide to liberation. in advaita philosophy, this role is filled by the upanishads, which, likewise, guide humans to an intuitive knowledge of brahman. though the end result (knowledge of ultimate reality and human freedom) is the same, the methods for achieving such knowledge differ. because advaita vedanta philosophy is an offshoot of a major religious tradition, it is not surprising that historically-important religious texts serve as the bedrock of ontological understanding and knowledge. similarly, it is unsurprising that spinoza, as an enlightenment thinker, rejects any sort of scriptural authority in favor of human intellect and reason. it cannot be doubted that this fact plays a significant role in his characterization as a western thinker (recall that an oft-cited hallmark of the western tradition is rational, intellectual inquiry). although this disparity between the traditions does exist, the actual substantive claims proposed by each remain strikingly comparable: that an understanding of reality is ultimately intuitive, and that it, alone, is the source of valid knowledge. another apparent difference is an ontological one. nirguna brahman, the true being of brahman, must be ineffable and without attributes. spinoza’s god, on the other hand, is described as having infinite attributes, including thought and extension. are these incompatible understandings of the divine, if one god is without attributes, and the other is with infinite attributes? i would argue, in fact, that these differing characterizations of god still provide the same substantive claim—that god and brahman both transcend human understanding, and both cannot be defined or constrained. 15issue v f spring 2018 spinoza the hindu the advaita adherent’s concern with attributing characteristics to nirguna brahman stems from the belief that any linguistic claim placed upon brahman would serve to limit its unlimited nature. brahman is ultimately inexpressible, because any attempt at expressing brahman is inadequate. spinoza’s god is, actually, quite similar to brahman in this way. spinoza does believe that god must have the attributes of thought and extension, because these are definable human attributes, and because god (as an infinite being) must encompass all attributes. yet, humans only have access to these two attributes: just as nirguna brahman encompasses and transcends both atman and the corporeal world, god encompasses and transcends the world and the human self as understood through thought or extension. although we can speak of god as having these attributes (just as we can attribute certain characteristics to saguna brahman [brahman with attributes]), the totality of spinoza’s god remains, because of this transcendence, similarly ineffable to the totality of nirguna brahman. nonetheless, if the situation is as described, then we have a western rationalist philosopher espousing an eastern religio-philosophical doctrine. it is here that we must examine the broader implications of this comparative analysis. in the postcolonial era, the east-west dichotomy has come under increasing attack from a variety of scholastic circles. edward said, an outspoken critic of such an “orient-occident” binary, has argued that the division is entirely mythical: that the imagined region of the orient is, in fact, “an idea that has a history and a tradition of thought, imagery and vocabulary that has given it reality and presence for the west.”37 said argues that, in its purported difference from the west, the very notion of the east (as espoused and understood by westerners) is imbued with “doctrines of european superiority, various kinds of racism, imperialism and the like”, and necessarily creates a power-dynamic that produces and justifies western domination.38 obviously, the dichotomy has proven itself tremendously controversial in recent years. it is my hope that this comparison between advaita vedanta hinduism and the ethics might spur further critique of that problematic ideology. through an examination of substantive similarities between eastern and western philosophical schools, a rigid east-west dichotomy might be unmasked as hopelessly reductionist. the argument that spiozism so closely mirrors the ontological and epistemological claims of advaita vedanta hinduism complicates the image of any fundamental ideological differences between eastern and western philosophy. the potential for a reexamination, and a critique of, that binary system is an intended consequence of my project. additionally, it is my firm belief that the type of comparative analysis exemplified in this paper provides us with a deeper understanding of seemingly disparate entities: an understanding that might have otherwise been unattainable, or entirely ignored. 37 said, edward w. orientalism. (london: routledge & kegan paul, 1978), 5 38 said, orientalism, 8. 16 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college when we discuss eastern and western philosophies in a comparative lens, fascinating results ensue. when we separate them based upon a purported incommensurability, we lose the potential for broader understandings of humanity at large, with its varied traditions and beliefs, regardless of geographic zone. i hope that further scholarly examinations of the subject matter of spinozistic-advaita comparative analysis might follow, so that we might see commonalities in both systems, across any imagined delineations. f bibliography brannigan, michael c. the pulse of wisdom: the philosophies of india, china, and japan. stamford, ct: wadsworth/thomson learning, 2000. hartshorne, charles and william l. reese. philosophers speak of god. amherst, ny: humanity books, 2000. hongladarom, soraj. “spinoza & buddhism on the self.” the oxford philosopher, july 29, 2015. no page numbers. melamed, s.m. spinoza and buddha: visions of a dead god. chicago: university of chicago press, 1933. s. radhakrishnan, trans., the principal upanishads. london: allen & unwin, ltd., 1953. rambachan, anantanand. the advaita worldview: god, world, and humanity albany, ny: state university of new york press, 2006. russell, bertrand. a history of western philosophy. london: allen & unwin, 1946. said, edward w. orientalism. london: routledge & kegan paul, 1978. spinoza, baruch. the ethics, treatise on the emendation of the intellect, and selected letters. translated by samuel shirley. edited by seymour feldman. 2nd ed. cambridge: hackett pub. co., 1992. ziporyn, b. (2012). spinoza and the self-overcoming of solipsism. comparative and continental philosophy, 4(1), 125. 57issue v f spring 2018 δι αν οι α revolution, revelation, responsibility: emancipatory futures in benjamin and habermas max fineman in order to clarify the functions of violence within the legal order of the modern state, walter benjamin does not claim that the state’s application of violence is unjust. rather, he interprets and critiques the very existence of a criterion of just violence whereby only some violence is legitimized. benjamin concludes that this criterion is in place to justify only those uses of violence that serve as a means to the establishment and preservation of the current rule of law. based on a critique of the instrumental use of legal violence, benjamin argues that this violence inevitably will serve the interests of state power, and he concludes that the only remedy to this situation is the total annihilation of the legal order. in the final pages of the essay, the “critique of violence,” benjamin thus sets out to find a new conception of violence, which is opposed to the legal violence he critiques (296-300). this violence, which he bases on the divine violence of the judeo-christian god, is meant to found a new emancipatory order. in his text, benjamin implicitly alludes to a robust vision for a revolutionary future in which individuals and communities operate according to self-regulated normative principles. such a view towards an emancipated society is founded initially on a revolutionary destruction of the present state-governed order, and on the generation of communities oriented towards responsible collective action based on shared commitments to autonomy. 58 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college benjamin conceives of divine violence as, first and foremost, an absolute destruction of the legal situation. therefore, it is necessary to conduct a brief review of law as benjamin understands it, and of the role that violence plays within any legal framework. for benjamin, the primary characteristic of legal violence is its use, as a means, within the legal system. the law is based on a promise that establishing a stable legal framework and solidifying the rule of law over society will produce a peaceful, nonviolent social order. all legal justifications of violence presuppose that the rule of law will establish, in the end, a community of citizens who are able to relate to each other without recourse to violence. they are supposedly able to do so specifically because the legal order carves out a social sphere in which such nonviolent interaction is possible.1 such an order is instrumental in the law’s establishment of a nonviolent sphere, which it accordingly views as just and worth pursuing, by whatever means necessary. violence is such a means. legal discourse always makes recourse to these two poles—means and ends—in order to justify the application of violence in specific cases. either the justness of the end towards which violence is applied as a means is used as a justification for the means, or the justness of the means itself is used as a justification for the end which that means brings about.2 in either case, the law provides justification for the application of violence as a means to the ends that the law—or the state—has set for itself. benjamin’s first critical move is to point out that such justification (for the application of violence as a means) must be made according to some criterion that would distinguish between just and unjust forms of instrumental violence. instead of evaluating the criterion itself, which would simply critique the application of specific instances of violence, benjamin wants to critique the very existence of a criterion of instrumental violence itself.3 such a criterion, benjamin argues, will always provide a justification for violence as a means to so-called ‘legal’ ends (namely, those ends that the law, or the state, acknowledges as legitimate). the existence of a criterion by which to justify certain forms of violence is a problem for benjamin because of his belief that any legal system (or at least any contemporary european legal system)4 will justify violence, which serves the ends that are established and maintained in the legal order. therefore, within any legal system that justifies violence as a means whatsoever, the law will suppress the ‘natural’, extralegal ends of individuals insofar as these natural ends might be pursued by violence.5 in other words, the law—or the legal state—will always seek to maintain a monopoly on violence. the state seeks to maintain complete control over the application of violence—an effort partially effected by the mechanisms of legal justification discussed above—because it views any kind of extralegal violence as a direct threat 1 walter benjamin, “critique of violence,” in reflections: essays, aphorisms, autobiographical writings, ed. peter demetz, trans. edmund jephcott (new york: schocken books, 1986), 278. 2 ibid., 278. 3 ibid., 279. 4 cf. ibid., 280. 5 ibid. 59issue v f spring 2018 revolution, revelation, responsibility to the existence of the law itself.6 this threat that extralegal violence poses to the legal order prefigures the place that benjamin reserves for his conception of utterly destructive divine violence. benjamin seeks to provide a critique of violence that does away with the means-ends framework of the legal order all together and thereby rejects the usage of violence as a means under any circumstance. the philosopher argues that a critique of all legal violence (i.e., all violence which is given approval and facilitated by the law) is necessary in order to address adequately the application of violence within any particular sphere.7 benjamin therefore understands that all legal violence is either law-making or law-preserving.8 in other words, all violence, which is enacted from within the means-ends legal scheme, and which is employed therein as a means, is always used either to establish or to maintain some legal situation. benjamin’s thesis here implies that even those forms of violence that are aimed at challenging the law’s power and at threatening the enforcement of the law cannot succeed as long as they still employ violence as a means.9 however just its ends may be, a revolutionary class that separates the violent means it uses from the ends it pursues will necessarily reestablish the same structure of legal ends that it seeks to dismantle. the instrumental use of even insurgent violence will necessarily fall back on this structure of legality because whenever a rebellious means is used to achieve some political end, it necessarily seeks to achieve that end within the realm of legal ends. in other words, insurgent use of violence as a means aims to establish its ends within the fundamentally problematic system of the law. such violence is thus revealed by benjamin as law-making violence, and, as such, participates in the same legal discourse that justifies violence as a means.10 benjamin substitutes the means-ends scheme that characterizes the social order under the rule of law with his conception of a violence that will liberate society altogether from the oppressive condition of a law-governed society. because the fundamental feature of the violence employed by the legal order was as a means to some end external to the act itself, benjamin founds his liberatory violence on a conception of non-instrumental action that binds the goals of the action, and the action itself, more tightly together.11 this form of action, which is not mediated by the external relations between means and ends, is the direct expression of will.12 benjamin wants to suggest a type of violence wherein the violent act emerges organically from the will, and which manifests the will itself. in the legal schema, instrumental violence was viewed as external to the ends that it sought to achieve in the sense that it could 6 ibid., 281. 7 ibid., 284. 8 ibid., 283-4. 9 ibid., 285; cf. 282. 10 cf. ibid., 287. 11 ibid., 293. 12 ibid., 294. 60 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college be distinguished clearly from those ends. when a union strikes, for instance, it is clear that its goal for better working conditions is distinct from the strike that it uses as a way of achieving its goal.13 in this schema, means and ends only relate to each other in their separateness—one is used to bring the other about. the immediately willed action to which benjamin now looks is different from the mediated action of a means because it cannot be separated from the will of which it is an expression. immediate violence is the realization of a will that seeks, for some reason, to exert its force upon the world. it is not meant to bring something else about, but to manifest a will which has no agenda but to see itself enacted in the world through violence. before benjamin explains how revolutionary violence transforms into divine violence, the philosopher offers an account of the mythical violence of the greek gods. mythical violence is indeed an immediate action in the sense described above: it does not seek some end further than the simple employment of violence itself.14 when the gods wreak havoc on the human world, provoking warfare, killing children, and spilling blood in the most extravagant acts of violence, their actions are not a direct a punishment of anyone, but rather are direct assertions of their existence in the face of a challenge to their authority or power. mythical violence cannot be anticipated in the same way that many forms of legal violence, and especially punitive law-preserving violence, can be expected, as part of a highly structured, calculative social system that regulates actions with predetermined responses. it is thus in a more immediate proximity to the gods’ existence that instrumental violence is first used purely as a means to the establishment and stability of the gods’ authority. despite the immediacy of this form of violence, mythical violence has a lawmaking character, which, is crucial to the originary establishment of the rule of law. although the gods’ enactment of violence serves no further purpose other than to direct the expression of their existence, this violence does establish a law-constituting control over the world.15 indeed, this violence is not a response to the violation of an already existing law. rather, it is a response to a direct threat to the gods. insofar as this response reinforces the authority of the gods over the world, it constitutes some kind of law that restricts action for those who experience the violence. this violence does not annihilate its victim completely. it stops short of complete destruction; instead it produces guilt in its victim for the challenge that he made to the established mythical order. it is not that the gods necessarily sought to manipulate their victim, but that the enactment of guilt expands their control and authority. benjamin finds that mythical violence is paradigmatically opposed to the kind of violence which he wants to found revolutionary action. mythical violence, rather than contradicting the law and the means-ends schema it establishes, mythical violence is 13 ibid., 291. 14 ibid., 294. 15 ibid., 295. 61issue v f spring 2018 revolution, revelation, responsibility foundational to the rule of law.16 benjamin’s several nods to mythical violence suggest that guilt, as a regulatory force on individuals’ actions, is an originary source for the structure of law itself. one should identify mythical violence as a non-instrumental precursor to the violence of the legal order. moreover, this parallel between mythical and legal violence also reveals that even when the legal order of the state employs violence as a means to the establishment of the rule of law, it does not actually exclude violence from its sphere of legal ends.17 mythical violence’s connection to lawmaking reveals that violence is related to legal ends not only as a means, but also as an immediate property of the law that does not do away with violence in its realm of ends. in some cases, the law has violence simply as its own end, as an expression of the existence of the law itself in a way that resembles mythical violence. when the law enacts violence simply for its own sake, it manifests violence as an immediate expression of its power. benjamin thus ultimately renders his conception of divine violence as both a destruction of mythical violence and as a parallel revolutionary destruction of the law.18 divine violence must be an act that, in addition to having the form of an immediate expression of will, brings utter annihilation to the normative world through the mythical-legal violence. divine violence, employing no psychological mechanism, is interested only in complete annihilation of whatever it finds wrong in the world and is destructive without limit19. this pure immediate violence sets up no law and, similarly, introduces no guilt into its victim for the simple reason that it does not spare its victim in any respect. instead of manifesting divine existence through violence, the divine will is expressed in violence. it seeks to annihilate transgression not because transgression threatens divine power, but, rather, because the divine despises transgression.19 benjamin contrasts divine violence’s purely “expiatory” character with the “guilt and retribution” associated with mythical violence. mythical violence engenders guilt in its victims by acting in response, as it were, to the transgression. in its enactment of violence, it holds the arrogance of the transgressive act up to the transgressor and clearly communicates that it is because of the transgressor’s actions against the mythical gods that this violence is inflicted upon them. this utilization of the transgression instills in the transgressor a guilty attitude towards his own act, and, in some sense, is itself perpetuated in this guilt. mythical violence thus utilizes the transgressive act as a method of control that sets boundaries for future action in the form of law. on the other hand, divine violence seeks to do nothing but annihilate this transgressiveness altogether.20 it despises the wrong that is committed, and it therefore acts directly 16 ibid. 17 ibid. 18 ibid., 296; 300. 19 i intend here transgression not in the legal sense of the breaking of a law but rather in the sense it has in the jewish tradition, namely the failure to act in accordance with the commandment. 20 benjamin, “critique of violence,” 297. 62 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college to purge its sphere of all transgression. it does not employ mechanisms of guilt, punishment, and control because its violence is not meant to regulate future action or solidify its control over the world. divine violence has nothing to gain in manifesting itself; it purges the world of transgressive wrong precisely so that the world will not be stained by the abhorrence of this transgression. this attitude implies that, in purging the transgressor from the world, divine violence rids the world of wrong not for its own sake, but, rather, for the sake of a better world. divine violence, then, is the manifestation of a will for a world free of wrong (and control)—a world it realizes by utterly annihilating and atoning for the remnants of wrong. if divine violence atones for wrong done in the world through boundless destruction, in what sense does benjamin intend for divine violence to be destructive of law? is the legal order simply a state of injustice that must be destroyed in order for a more just social life to be established? perhaps the most tempting interpretation would read divine violence as offering a solution to the problematic social situation created by the rule of law. after all, benjamin has given a robust critique of the rule of law by exposing the way in which law deploys violence in order to bolster its power and stability. this operation of violence and the consequent harm it causes to its society might be reason enough to label law as an injustice deserving of divine violence. if so, then divine violence would “expiate” simply by directly attacking the unjust, violent operation of law. such a condemnation of law presumes a far more robust ethical framework than benjamin is willing to grant. benjamin needs to conduct a critique of the criterion by which violence is justified and enacted because this criterion lacks general insight into the nature of law. the criterion of justified violence presupposes the means-end structure of law and only then proceeds to derive theories of what constitutes justice and injustice. it makes no sense, therefore, to speak of the injustice of the law because the law is a precondition for the establishment of a framework that determines justice. in other words, divine violence enacts justice or destroys injustice. its destruction does not have a ‘just’ character because it does not presume any general criterion for justice or for the just application of violence. rather than viewing the law as an injustice, i suggest that benjamin views divine violence as “law-destroying” insofar as it frees the living from the selfish controlling mechanisms of the legal order, which it does in two ways. divine violence takes an immediate form that rejects the law’s instrumental use of violence. it does not make use of violence in order to incur guilt or to exact punishment, and it, therefore, does not threaten, or make demands upon, the living. as will be shown later, even within the scheme of divine violence and the world that it establishes, individuals have responsibility (though that responsibility is not accountable for divine violence itself ). thus, divine violence destroys law, firstly, in the sense that it replaces the methods of control used by legal violence with direct annihilation wherever it finds something it regards as a transgression. secondly, through this annihilation, divine 63issue v f spring 2018 revolution, revelation, responsibility violence atones for the transgressor who has been made guilty by the punitive violence of the law. legal violence establishes guilt in its victim, which generates the subjective means for the law to assert itself over its subjects. divine violence gets rid of such guilt because it completely destroys. it leaves no trace of the transgression at all, and guilt is thus atoned for in the process. this utter annihilation is non-instrumental. it has no further goals, and guilt and punishment have no place in a will that does not seek control. since law made use of guilt as the basis for its control, divine violence undermines the law in this second way by expiating the guilt on which the law relies. one of benjamin’s larger goals in the essay is to provide, through an exposition of his understanding of divine violence, an argument for the possibility of revolutionary violence and a suggestion for what proper revolutionary violence might look like.21 as discussed earlier, any violence that is still instrumentalized as a means cannot be truly revolutionary because it leaves the legal order of instrumental action intact. no matter how just the goals of a revolutionary class might be, the same oppressive and coercive legal power will be reproduced as long as the violence it employs is only a means to those goals. instead, true revolutionary violence must seek to destroy the rule of law itself and the order through which the rule of law is perpetuated, (i.e., the state). revolutionary violence, in taking after, or even realizing divine violence, must not set itself the goal of establishing a new order. such a new order cannot be known to the agents of the revolution. revolutionary violence is the expression of a will to rid the world of legal state power and of the coercive violence it deploys. this will cannot conceive of a future that will lie beyond the revolution, for such a conception would necessarily instrumentalize the violence it enacts. instead, like divine violence, proper revolutionary violence will seek to annihilate what it despises, namely the legal state apparatus. benjamin thus takes a firm position against utopian revolution, because it sets ends beyond the revolution itself. for benjamin, the revolutionary future lies beyond the horizon of all political imagination, and can only emerge immanently out of the ruins of an already dismantled law-governed state. benjamin’s view on violence certainly raises concerns. if revolutionary violence is to have no mechanism to justify its use, and no systematic way of regulating, or limiting, its application, then can there be any limit to this violence? providing an ideal concept of immediate violence seems to be dangerous if the violence is enacted by a will that takes up the wrong kinds of ends. when violence no longer is a means for the establishment of a peaceful society, but, rather, is an expression of the will to destroy, the effect of that violence becomes totally contingent on the will, which enacts this violence. if the revolution cannot conceive of higher social goals beyond the revolution itself, how can there be any guarantee of emancipation? furthermore, benjamin recognizes that we do not have historical examples of this kind of violence on which to base our inquiry. because divine violence leaves no trace of guilt in the 21 ibid., 300. 64 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college victim it annihilates, its “expiatory power [... ] is not visible to men”.22 for benjamin’s vision of revolutionary violence to be at all feasible, then, we need to specify some sphere outside of the cycle of legal forces that will be able to provide some guiding norms for revolutionary action. benjamin provides a brief suggestion of such a sphere in his notion of commandment. the commandment, for benjamin, is the articulation of a principle for guiding action delivered through the medium of language.23 it is an imperative for action directed at individuals, which they are meant to adopt as their own when they encounter other people as agentive persons. the commandment is thus always known before the opportunity for action. unlike legal norms, which regulate people’s actions whether or not these persons are individually aware of specific laws,24 the commandment operates through its communication to persons who must consider their own action. individuals are bound in obligation only at the moment in which the commandment has been communicated to them. as an internalized guiding principle for individuals and communities, the commandment does not operate through a punitive threat, as the law does. the commandment always precedes the deed, and it remains for the persons who have received the commandment to consider the conditions and exceptions of its application. the commandment cannot be used as a criterion for the judgement of an action after it has been executed and it certainly cannot stand as an ex post facto judgement. this notion of commandment accords with benjamin’s rejection of the instrumental logic of legal discourse. in legal frameworks, adherence to legal norms is guaranteed by the threat of punishment. legal violence, and lawpreserving violence in particular, is used as a means to ensure the rule of the legal order by externally subjecting individuals to the law through punishment. mechanisms of punishment and the fear of punishment ensure adherence to the law through the instrumentalization of violence. the commandment does not ensure adherence to the law, because it is not at all concerned with punishment or judgement, and, therefore, does not instrumentalize violence in pursuit of obedience. rather, individuals act in accordance with the commandment based on a shared affirmation that it is a principle worthy of adherence. i will argue now that such a collective commitment to commandment-like norms can be grounded in the responsibility that is generated from the commandment’s linguistic character. this notion of non-punitive commandment provides a possible source for a revolutionary normativity that does not rely on the logic of legal discourse. if the central concern regarding benjamin’s vision for revolutionary violence is that it has no principle to guide revolutionary action, then the commandment is a potential source for action-orienting principles, because it does not impose itself externally and instrumentally upon normative actors. if its end is for individuals and communities 22 ibid. 23 ibid., 298. 24 cf. ibid., 296. 65issue v f spring 2018 revolution, revelation, responsibility to act in ways that it regards as normatively valuable, then it does not force them to do so; it tells them to do so. the commandment mobilizes shared language to give the norm, from the one who commands, to those who are commanded. this notion of normative action, based on a communicated principle, is advantageous because it cultivates autonomy, which the law could not establish, in the acting individual. because the law generates obedience only externally in the individual through punishment, the individual is always subject to the law. the law always acts upon him. the commandment, on the other hand, is a principle of action that is not enforced, but, rather, is given to the individual. individuals must grapple on their own with its application in the real circumstances of their lives.25 unlike the law, the commandment does not make decisions for the individual. this autonomy is advantageous because it allows individuals to make crucial pragmatic judgements about the norm’s applicability and its inevitable exceptions. it is additionally advantageous because it does not require the external force of a regulative system through which normative action must be guaranteed. rather, individuals (and communities) who follow the commandment determine their own adherence to the project of collective normative action. this commandment model for revolutionary normative action raises another difficulty: we have not yet explained how individuals are guaranteed to commit to norms without coercion, or by the threat of punishment. if normative action is not centralized by a legal-punitive system of action regulation, we are going to need to specify some ground for believing that individuals and communities would adhere to these norms. additionally, while the model of the non-punitive commandment might be attractive to a benjaminian sensibility, benjamin fails to provide any explanation of the source of these norms. we therefore must specify how the content of such commandment-style norms are generated. as we will see, habermas’s notions of responsibility and language, and the emancipatory potential that lies in their relation, provide a possible grounding for our benjaminian vision of normative action. in his essay, “knowledge and human interests: a general perspective,” habermas sets out a critique of all knowledge-producing sciences by revealing the “knowledgeconstitutive interests” that determine the methodological framework in which scientists pursue each form of knowledge. habermas’s core argument is that all epistemic practices are oriented by interests that humans have in gaining particular kinds of knowledge. therefore, the methodological tools that we use for inquiring about, and for investigating the world, are not determined by a disinterested strategic concern with the best manner of getting at an objective truth. rather, the fundamental practical human interests that we seek to satisfy by pursuing knowledge determine these tools. these interests therefore provide the frame for our inquiries. according to habermas, despite science’s aspiration to disinterested theoretical inquiry, we cannot 25 ibid., 298. 66 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college rid our epistemic practices of these human interests.26 instead, the task of critical theory is to make these interests visible so that the sciences can proceed with a ‘critical eye’ towards the influence that particular interests have on knowledge-production. this ‘critical eye’ is meant to give the theorist a certain autonomy within the interestconstraints placed on our attainable knowledge. one of these knowledge-constitutive interests is an “emancipatory” interest in autonomy and responsibility. habermas argues that this fundamental human drive towards emancipation leads us to engage in reflection about our own social conditions, which will ultimately identify the ways in which we have been subjected to “hypostatized powers”, and consequently, the ways in which we can free ourselves from the oppressive social conditions in which we are stuck.27 the project that habermas suggests for critical theory is to develop sciences, which are aware of the social and cultural conditions of their knowledge-production, through engaging in this kind of self-reflection.28 they will therefore be able to identify more “emancipatory” ways of satisfying their respective human interests. this suggested project of self-reflection of the sciences leads habermas to consider what grounds the human interest in autonomy and responsibility (i.e., language). habermas’s idea is that implicit in the intersubjective communication, whereby language links people together, is a will towards “universal and unconstrained consensus.”29 in using language, humans recognize, at some level, the will to be understood by, and to be in agreement with, others. language is thus premised on an assumption of mutual understanding; language must be shared language. this mutuality of language evinces a certain will towards universal dialogue: anyone who has access to the language can understand and be understood. no matter how simple its use of language is, every utterance aspires to an intersubjective communication, which is based wholly on shared, agreed-upon linguistic rules. in the ideal structure of language, no external constraints are imposed on linguistic usage, and any attempt to do so only inhibits language users’ ability to communicate clearly and to create consensus-based dialogue. the structure of language as unconstrained universal communication among language users is generative of responsibility because it allows for individuals to gain mutual understanding of the importance of their autonomy and of the autonomy of others. we can use language with each other to come to agreements about what kinds of action are worthy of our collective pursuit. language allows for individuals to assent freely to consensus-based actions, and their responsibility towards each other, and towards the agreed-upon norms, is based upon their unconstrained practice 26 jürgen habermas, “knowledge and human interests: a general perspective,” in knowledge and human interests, trans. jeremy j. shapiro (boston: beacon press, 1971), 311. 27 ibid., 310. 28 ibid., 311. 29 ibid., 314. 67issue v f spring 2018 revolution, revelation, responsibility of consensus-building in language. when individuals and communities engage in “non-authoritarian and universally practiced dialogue,” they can come to normative agreements based on communication unencumbered by the interests of power, selfishness, and greed.30 rather, because every individual knows that his personal interests can be understood in this kind of communication, strategic and selfish linguistic maneuvers are replaced by collective commitment to agreed-upon norms. habermas’ notion of collective responsibility and commitment to such norms, which are grounded in language, provides the necessary basis that was lacking for benjamin’s notion of the commandment. using this understanding of unconstrained communication about norms, we can give a complete account of a possible non-legal, non-punitive vision of normative action. the structure of the commandment can be seen as an ideal example of consensus-based normative principles. as aforementioned, the commandment only binds those who have understood the content of the commandment and who have agreed to follow it. it is not an expression of a force, power, or threat according to whose will individuals must act. the commandment is delivered through language, and its binding nature is dependent on the understanding and assent of all parties. the commandment is thus an example of a universally agreedupon norm grounded in language. this requirement of universal understanding of the norm before it becomes binding provides a level of assurance that norms will be followed based on a collective responsibility for the norms’ realization. those who “wrestle in solitude”31 with the commandment have the responsibility to faithfully apply the agreed-upon normative principles, and it is up to them—and only them— to ensure that these forms of action are realized. one final indication that habermas’ notion of communication-based responsibility is deeply compatible with benjamin’s revolutionary vision is found in habermas’ suggestion that the kind of unconstrained communication upon which all understanding is built is only possible in a fully emancipated society.32 in an unfree society, external conditions impose constraints upon language-use. the law mobilizes language instrumentally to control legal subjects, and the state deploys language in the construction of ideologies that deceive people into thinking that their social conditions are natural. such uses of language are not based on mutual understanding or a will towards universal consensus. rather, they are based in the instrumentalization of language as a quasi-violent means towards the ends of state power and the perpetuation of the rule of law. these uses thus play into the meansend schema of the legal order repeatedly mentioned by benjamin in his critique. therefore, only in a society that is free of the power-accumulating forces of the instrumental legal order, is an unconstrained normative consensus actually possible. these legal forces, which instrumentalize violence and mobilize guilt as a means of 30 ibid. 31 benjamin, 298. 32 habermas, 314. 68 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college control, must be destroyed by benjaminian divine-like revolutionary violence. only then, in an emancipated, revolutionary society, can the kind of language-use and communication required for the generation of responsibility be truly enacted. with the destruction of the legal forces that place fetters on the progressive realization of the fundamental human interest in autonomy and responsibility, the historical horizon opens up towards an ethical future in which normative action is based on autonomous collective commitments and responsibilities, rather than on coercion and the suppression of cooperative initiative. f bibliography benjamin, walter. “critique of violence.” in reflections: essays, aphorisms, autobiographical writings, edited by peter demetz, translated by edmund jephcott, 277-300. new york: schocken books, 1986. habermas, jürgen. “knowledge and human interests: a general perspective.” in knowledge and human interests, translated by jeremy j. shapiro, 301-317. boston: beacon press, 1971. 69issue v f spring 2018 δι αν οι α a defense of the gods: interpreting plato's myth of er christopher fahey the myth of er begins with a soldier named er, who dies in battle but comes back to life twelve days later to tell of what he saw in the afterlife.1 er says that those who lived just lives were rewarded by the gods, and that those who lived unjust lives were punished, each for a thousand years.2 after undergoing these rewards or punishments, the souls select the next lives that they will live, and are thus reborn. 3some scholars, such as julia annas and ronald r. johnson, believe that the primary purpose of the myth is to summarize the main argument of the republic. it seems, however, that the myth does not serve exclusively as summary; in fact, socrates’ main purpose in relating the myth is to restore the reputation of the gods as totally good after assuming the opposite throughout most of the republic. at the beginning of her article, “plato’s myths of judgement,” annas asserts that most philosophers have failed to demonstrate how the myths in plato’s dialogues are relevant to the primary philosophical arguments of those dialogues.4 in addition to discussing the eschatological myths in the gorgias and phaedo, annas describes how the myth of er relates to the primary argument made by socrates in the republic. 1 plato, republic, trans. g. m. a. grube, ed. c. d. c. reeve, 2nd ed. (indianapolis: hackett, 1992), 614b. 2 ibid., 614c-616b. 3 ibid., 617d-621b. 4 julia annas, “plato’s myths of judgement,” phronesis 27, no. 2 (1982): 119. 70 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college 5although, in book ii, socrates identifies justice as “one of the greatest goods, the ones that are worth getting for the sake of what comes from them, but much more so for their own sake,” glaucon wants socrates to explain how justice is a good only in “its very self ”, leaving out any consideration of “wages and reputations” accorded to those who are just.6 to explain that justice is a good “in its very self ” becomes the aim of the main argument of the republic.7 but, according to annas, if the myth of er is understood as suggesting that one should be just because of the rewards that he will receive in the afterlife, then its message directly conflicts with this main argument. 8to resolve this apparent conflict, annas advances a radically different interpretation of the myth. she asserts that since, according to plato, our souls select our next lives (after undergoing their temporal rewards or punishments), our actions have been determined by our past selves.9 but we do not remember our past selves after drinking from the waters of the river of unheeding10 and therefore, we are, in a sense, not the same people as our past selves.11 this, she says, “must tend to paralyze any sense of being truly responsible for being the kind of person one is.”12 under this conviction, one will realize that any punishments and rewards accorded to them in the afterlife become meaningless.13 annas, therefore, inverts the message that the myth conveys. but this, she says, shows that the myth in fact supports what she identifies as the main argument of the republic: that justice is to be sought for itself, rather than for its consequences.14 there are a number of problems with annas’ analysis. some objections are posed by ronald r. johnson in his article “does plato’s myth of er contribute to the argument of the republic?” johnson disagrees with annas’ view that if the myth demonstrates that meaningful rewards and punishments await the just and unjust in the afterlife, then it must subvert the republic’s main argument.15 rather, johnson asserts that, by the time socrates relates the myth, the philosopher has already sufficiently demonstrated that justice is a good worth pursuing in itself regardless of its consequences.16 johnson believes that by including the myth, plato “now wants to say that [...] the just life is not actually subject to such gross misunderstanding on the part of humans and gods.”17 in doing so, johnson says, plato does not intend to show that the rewards awaiting the just person in the afterlife are the real reason to be just— 5 ibid., 129-39. 6 plato, republic, 367d. 7 annas, “plato’s myths of judgement,” 130. 8 ibid. 9 ibid., 132. 10 plato, republic, 621a. 11 annas, “plato’s myths of judgement,” 132. 12 ibid. 13 ibid. 14 ibid., 137. 15 ronald r. johnson, “does plato’s ‘myth of er’ contribute to the argument of the ‘republic’?” philosophy & rhetoric 32, no. 1 (1999): 4. 16 ibid. 17 ibid. 71issue v f spring 2018 a defense of the gods “he is merely saying that these extra benefits are part of the just life as well.”18 johnson also points out that annas’ interpretation “flatly contradicts what plato has socrates give as his reason for relating the myth,” which can be found in the introductory passage prior to the myth, from 612b to 614b. indeed, an examination of this passage serves to support johnson’s view of the myth, which stands in opposition to annas’. first, it is clear from this passage that socrates believes that he has successfully completed the main argument of the republic and wants now to point out that the gods and men do reward justice and punish injustice. at 612b, for example, socrates inquires of glaucon: “and haven’t we found that justice itself is the best thing for the soul itself, and that the soul—whether it has the ring of gyges or even it together with the cap of hades—should do just things?”19 glaucon agrees, and so socrates proposes to return to a discussion of the additional rewards accorded to the just: then can there now be any objection, glaucon, if in addition we return to justice and the rest of virtue both the kind and quantity of wages that they obtain for the soul from human beings and gods, whether in this life or the next?20 to this, glaucon replies, “none whatever.”21 it is clear from this part of the introduction that socrates seeks to discuss the consequences of being just versus unjust “in addition” to the main argument of the text, and not as a conclusion meant to supplant the main argument and totally nullify his progress thus far. further, socrates makes clear that “the prizes, wages and gifts that a just person receives from gods and humans while he is alive [...] are added to the good things that justice itself provides,”22 but are not to be viewed as the primary goods of justice (those that come from possessing justice itself ), for they are simply “added” to those goods. thus, socrates himself does not seem to believe a discussion of these goods would undercut his previous argument. this introductory passage reveals that socrates believes that not only the gods reward justice and punish injustice, but that these rewards and punishments are significant. at 612c, socrates says that he wants to “return to justice and the rest of virtue both the kind and quantity of wages that they obtain for the soul.”23 the word “return” in this statement is key—socrates clearly believes that men and gods will reward those who are just. on top of this, socrates believes that, although the argument borrows these rewards from justice “for the sake of the argument” (as per glaucon’s request at 367d), these rewards must now be rightfully “returned” to justice.24 here we see that socrates is so certain of the idea (that the just are ultimately rewarded 18 ibid. 19 plato, republic, 612b. 20 ibid. [emphasis added] 21 ibid., 612c. 22 ibid., 613e. [emphasis added] 23 ibid., 612c. 24 ibid., 612c. 72 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college and that the unjust are punished) that even as he makes his argument throughout the republic, there is never any question in his mind that this is the case. throughout the introduction, socrates continues to reinforce this idea. of the rewards accorded by men, socrates says that “toward the end of each course of action, association, or life,” the just “enjoy a good reputation and collect the prizes from other human beings,”25 while the unjust, “even if they escape detection when they’re young, are caught by the end of the race and are ridiculed.”26 of rewards from the gods, socrates says that, because the gods are good,27 they “never neglect anyone who eagerly wishes to become just and who makes himself as much like a god as a human can by adopting a virtuous way of life.”28 furthermore, socrates not only clearly asserts that ultimately the just man will be rewarded and the unjust man punished by gods and men, but, in opposition to annas’ claim, he also believes that these rewards and punishments are actually meaningful and significant to human beings. at 614a, glaucon remarks that the rewards for the just man that socrates has just described are “very fine and secure ones too.”29 socrates implicitly agrees with this when he further states, “yet they’re nothing in either number or size compared to those that await just and unjust people after death.”30 it is this statement that leads into the elaboration of these rewards in the myth of er. so, throughout his introduction to the myth of er, socrates is clearly trying to demonstrate that being just or unjust comes with due rewards or punishments both here and in the next life, and that these rewards and punishments matter. annas’ view that socrates should then attempt to demonstrate that these rewards or punishments are “arbitrary” and “pointless” in the myth of er31 is thus inconsistent with the philosopher’s introduction. supporters of annas’ view might counter that socrates’ remarks could be somehow ironic; perhaps socrates is making these remarks even though, according to annas’ interpretation, he must know that he is about to demonstrate that they are wrong through the myth that follows. however, this seems far-fetched. barring this interpretation, johnson points out that annas’ interpretation of the myth remains in conflict with socrates’ introduction to it.32 annas does, in fact, acknowledge this problem herself in her article, but responds with the statement that the construction of book 10 is “scrappy and unsatisfactory as a whole.”33 johnson finds this claim to be unfounded.34 indeed, it seems that annas wants to ignore this issue, while johnson remarks that perhaps the myth should be interpreted differently. 35 25 ibid., 613c. 26 ibid., 613d. 27 ibid., 379b. 28 ibid., 613b. 29 ibid., 614a. 30 ibid. 31 annas, “plato’s myths of judgement,” 132. 32 johnson, “plato’s ‘myth of er’,” 4. 33 annas, “plato’s myths of judgement,” quoted in johnson, “plato’s ‘myth of er’,” 4. 34 johnson, “plato’s ‘myth of er’,” 4. 35 ibid. 73issue v f spring 2018 a defense of the gods johnson also argues that annas misinterprets plato’s view of reincarnation.36 as mentioned above, annas believes that if humans’ lives are determined by their past selves in the afterlife, then they cannot really feel responsible for their present actions since it was not really they who chose their lives. if humans are not really responsible for their actions, then any punishments and rewards that they face in the afterlife mean nothing.37 to this, johnson responds that “it is not clear why annas separates the soul and the ‘i,’ and it is not at all evident that plato separates them.”38 indeed, plato probably would not have thought about this issue in such a logically rigorous way, which seems characteristic of modern philosophy, in his relating of the myth. it is likely that plato did not include the depiction of the souls drinking from the river of unheeding at 621a to demonstrate that humans should feel no responsibility for their actions, but, rather, as michael inwood notes, to provide an explanation for why—if reincarnation does exist—humans cannot remember their past lives. 39however, inwood writes: the absence of memory might still be invoked either to argue that reincarnation does not occur or to suggest that, even if it does occur, no one has good reason to care about their past and future reincarnations.40 though annas would agree, inwood states that it is possible, upon returning to the afterlife, that souls might be capable of remembering all of their previous lives (at least, presumably, before drinking of the waters of the river of unheeding once again).41 this is speculation, but plato does not explicitly preclude this possibility of remembrance. for example, at 619b, socrates states, regarding the process of choosing one’s next life, that “we must always know how to choose the mean in such lives and how to avoid either of the extremes, as far as possible, both in this life and in all those beyond it. this is the way that a human being becomes happiest.”42 here, socrates seems to believe that the human being who becomes happy is the one who must “avoid [...] extremes,” while choosing “all those” lives “beyond” this one. this would imply that socrates thinks that in each successive life, our souls still remain “us,” and “we” will have some kind of memory in the afterlife in order to recognize this. thus, annas’ position that socrates means to show that we retain no sense of the “i” in lives after our current one43 may not be correct. if this is the case, the rewards and punishments for leading a just, versus an unjust life, might not be pointless, after all—as annas claims44—because in the afterlife we might remember that we, in fact, were the ones who chose the lives we lived. 36 ibid. 37 annas, “plato’s myths of judgement,” 131-32. 38 johnson, “plato’s ‘myth of er’,” 4. 39 michael inwood, “plato’s eschatological myths,” in plato’s myths, ed. catalin partenie (new york: cambridge university press, 2009), 33. 40 ibid. 41 ibid. 42 plato, republic, 619b. 43 annas, “plato’s myths of judgement,” 131. 44 ibid., 132. 74 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college johnson also criticizes annas for “claim[ing] against plato’s repeated assertion that reincarnation leaves individuals no significant choice over the lives they will live.” 45annas notes that, at 620a, plato wants to show that souls in the afterlife choose the next lives they will live on the basis of how they lived their most recent lives and the temporal rewards or punishments that they have just undergone.46 but these former lives, annas says, were themselves determined by the soul’s prior life choices in the afterlife, such that no soul has free choice when it comes to selecting its next life. 47however, it seems that socrates clearly supports the idea that souls do have freedom to choose their next lives: “the responsibility lies with the one who makes the choice; the god has none.”48 in fact, annas acknowledges this very evidence, but says that “plato [...] gives no reason for” this assertion.49 johnson, however, remarks that plato does not need to: “whether he is able to persuade anyone may be another matter, but there is no confusion over what he is saying.”50 but annas says that even if this is so, what a soul in the afterlife is selecting is “a fully worked-out blueprint” of the next life that it will live, so during this next life, it cannot possibly feel responsible for its actions because those actions were predetermined.51 as inwood points out, though, one problem with this determinist interpretation is that it contradicts “those passages in which socrates exhorts us to take precautionary steps in this life, to study for example the effects of a life on the soul.”52 socrates makes such a recommendation to glaucon at 618c, saying that in this life, “each of us must [...] be most concerned to seek out and learn those [subjects] that will enable him to distinguish the good life from the bad” to prepare for choosing our next lives.53 if socrates is saying that free choice is an illusion, then there is no purpose in heeding his advice in such passages as these.54 furthermore, if individuals have no free choice, then socrates reiterates the main argument of the republic (that individuals should choose to be just regardless of consequences) in vain. in light of these conflicts, perhaps socrates does not include the account of souls choosing their next lives (617d-618b) in order to demonstrate that we wholly determine our future lives while in the afterlife. rather, perhaps his message is that it is we—and not the gods—who control our fate. therefore, we should not blame the gods for misfortune that we have brought upon ourselves through our actions. if this is true, then this would undermine annas’ claim that we should feel no responsibility for our actions. it is clear, then, from johnson’s critique, that there are some problems with annas’ interpretation of the myth of er. having posed these objections, johnson goes on 45 johnson, “plato’s ‘myth of er’,” 5. 46 annas, “plato’s myths of judgement,” 132. 47 ibid. 48 plato, republic, 617e. 49 annas, “plato’s myths of judgement,” 133. 50 johnson, “plato’s ‘myth of er’,” 5. 51 annas, “plato’s myths of judgement,” 134. 52 inwood, “plato’s eschatological myths,” 45. 53 plato, republic, 618c. 54 inwood, “plato’s eschatological myths,” 46. 75issue v f spring 2018 a defense of the gods to attempt to show “how the myth does the philosophical work required of it as the conclusion of the overall argument of the republic.”55 in accordance with his first objection to annas’ argument, johnson acknowledges that one purpose of the myth of er is, in fact, to support what he calls the “addendum”56—the idea that the just will be ultimately rewarded and that the unjust will be punished for their actions.57 however, johnson asserts that providing support for the ‘addendum’ is not the primary goal of the myth; rather, like annas, he claims that the myth’s chief purpose must be to support the work’s main argument in order to serve as a proper conclusion to the republic.58 johnson says that the main argument of the republic can be divided into two parts: part a and part b. in part a, socrates shows that one “necessary condition” in order to live the just (and therefore happiest) life is “psychological wellbeing” (i.e., when the reasoning part of the soul rules the appetitive and spirited parts). in part b, socrates shows that another such condition is to be “living in harmony with the good” and to be understanding reality for what it really is.59 the primary evidence that johnson cites from the myth to support part b is socrates’ description of the spindle of necessity (616c-617d), which johnson says is a representation of the “order and rationality behind all that is”: ‘the good’ with which socrates says the soul must live harmoniously in order to be just and happy.60 the primary evidence that johnson cites in support of part a of the argument is 620d-621b, where it is stated that the souls preparing for their next earthly lives are told to drink from the river of forgetfulness, and that they must not drink too much of the river’s water.61 the “reason” in their souls must not give in to the “appetitive beast within them that is goading them to drink freely.”62 johnson also notes that odysseus, who has subjugated the spirited part of his soul to the rational, and who chooses a life that will allow him to seek ‘the good,’ is therefore representative of both parts a and b of the argument. 63 it is certainly plausible that the evidence that johnson selects was included by socrates in order to point to what johnson identifies as the two parts of the republic’s main argument. some might disagree with johnson’s claim that the myth’s purpose is to communicate the idea that “the work’s main argument [...] should be taken more seriously than the addendum.”64 viewing the myth as a whole, socrates’ descriptions of the spindle of necessity, the river of forgetfulness, and the soul of odysseus appear to stand as tangential asides to the bulk of the myth, which is the overarching story of the soul’s journey through reward or punishment and 55 johnson, “plato’s ‘myth of er’,” 5. 56 ibid., 6. 57 ibid., 7. 58 ibid. 59 ibid., 6. 60 ibid., 8. 61 ibid., 10. 62 ibid., 11. 63 ibid., 10. 64 ibid., 12. 76 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college then rebirth in the afterlife. additionally, johnson’s interpretation poses one of the same problems as annas’: it is contradicted by socrates’ own introduction to the myth in 612b-614b.65 though johnson acknowledges that one purpose of the myth is to support the ‘addendum,’66 socrates’ lengthy discussion—of the rewards and punishments accorded to the just and unjust by gods and men—in this passage clearly, as aforementioned, serves to introduce the chief purpose of the myth as a description of the rewards and punishments that will be accorded in the afterlife. in addition to this introductory passage, the passage with which socrates concludes the myth (621c-d) also serves to illuminate the myth’s chief purpose. johnson calls attention to this passage in support of his argument.67 however, socrates seems to acknowledge in this passage that the myth is basically unrelated to the main argument. he says that if we are “persuaded” only by the myth, then “we would then make a good crossing of the river of forgetfulness, and our souls wouldn’t be defiled.”68 implicit in the statement that we will make a “good crossing” of the river is the idea that we will collect our rewards (for being just) from the gods as part of the entire reincarnation process. therefore, socrates suggests that being persuaded by the myth will lead one to live a just life because of the after-life rewards promised to the just man.69 however, socrates then moves beyond this discussion of the myth: but if we are persuaded by me, [...] we’ll always hold to the upward path, practicing justice with reason in every way. [...] hence, both in this life and on the thousand-year journey we’ve described, we’ll do well and be happy.70 in this passage, when socrates says “if we are persuaded by me,” he means to say that, as johnson understands it, “if we believe the whole of the republic.”71 in other words, socrates means that his argument is capable of persuading us that justice is a good in itself, and so it will bring us happiness in this life. thus, socrates seems here to draw a distinction between the persuasive power of the myth of er and that of the argument he makes throughout the entirety of the rest of the republic. indeed, johnson says that “this last-minute comparison seems to suggest that the myth of er, in itself, is an insufficient guide to the happiest life.”72 in the same paragraph, though, johnson states that “the myth of er is a powerful conclusion to the republic, so long as we recognize the story as an illustration of the whole argument.”73 this seems contradictory: one wonders why socrates would draw such a comparison, and thus, why he would demonstrate the inadequacy of the myth (if, in fact, it did serve 65 ibid., 4. 66 ibid., 11. 67 ibid. 68 plato, republic, 621c. 69 johnson, “plato’s ‘myth of er’,” 11. 70 plato, republic, 621c-d. 71 johnson, “plato’s ‘myth of er’,” 11. 72 ibid. 73 ibid. 77issue v f spring 2018 a defense of the gods as a summary of the work’s main argument). for these reasons, johnson’s view that the myth is meant to summarize the main argument of the republic, like annas’ view, may be flawed. with johnson and annas’ shared view (that the myth of er must conclude the republic by not only summarizing, but also by asserting the primacy of its main argument) challenged, then what could be plato’s reason for including the myth in the work? on this point, the view of the myth that paul friedlander provides in his book plato: an introduction is instructive. friedlander calls attention to a myth about the afterlife related by cephalus in book i of the republic.74 here, friedlander is referring to 330d-331c, in which cephalus briefly describes after-life punishments and rewards: when someone thinks his end is near, he becomes frightened and concerned about things he didn’t fear before. it’s then that the stories we’re told about hades [...] twist his soul this way and that for fear that they’re true. [...] but someone who knows that he hasn’t been unjust has sweet good hope as his constant companion.75 friedlander sees this myth as belonging to his “first level” of classification of myths in plato, which are those related by socrates’ interlocutors prematurely, prior to the completion of philosophical discourse.76 but friedlander sees the myth of er, conveyed by socrates himself, as belonging to the “second level”77 of those myths that are related by socrates once the discourse is complete.78 indeed, friedlander makes the following important point: since [the republic] has also absorbed the older ‘thrasymachus’ [book i], with its myth at the beginning, beginning and end are seen in reciprocal correlation. the perfect construction at the end answers the unsatisfactory attempt at the beginning.79 in support of the idea that the myth stands in “reciprocal correlation” to book i is john sallis’ view that the structure of the republic as a whole is symmetrical.80 it is not only book i that stands in symmetry to book x, but also books ii through iv, which represent the construction of the “city in word,” and which stand in symmetric opposition to the “destruction” of the city in books viii and ix.81 the allegory of the cave, in book vii, is then the “center,” across which the other books are 74 paul friedlander, plato: an introduction, trans. hans meyerhoff (princeton: princeton university press, 1969), 177. 75 plato, republic, 330d-331a. 76 friedlander, plato: an introduction, 178-79. 77 ibid., 184. 78 ibid., 208. 79 ibid., 184. 80 john sallis, being and logos: reading the platonic dialogues, 3rd ed. (bloomington: indiana university press, 1996), 455. 81 ibid. 78 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college symmetric.82 according to this understanding of the work, perhaps the myth of er no longer needs to function as summary, but instead as a response to the myth in the opening book, and as a return to the discussion, begun and temporarily abandoned in book i (330d-331b), of whether justice truly is rewarded and injustice punished by the gods. indeed, this understanding of the myth is equivalent to johnson’s initial remark that one purpose of the myth is to show that the just life is not “subject to such gross misunderstanding” by the gods.83 but where johnson ultimately identified this purpose as nothing more than an “addendum,” a tangential aim subordinate to what he believes is the myth’s greater aim to summarize the main argument of the republic, it seems that if, as friedlander says, the myth of er lies in structural opposition to book i, then perhaps the myth need not serve as a conclusion for the entire work. then, vindication of the gods and affirmation that they do punish the unjust and reward the just can be understood as the myth’s primary aim. but why does socrates feel such a need to return to cephalus’ myth in book i and vindicate the gods? the answer lies in book ii, in which socrates, glaucon, and adeimantus begin to discuss what kind of poetry should be admitted into the city. at 379c, socrates maintains that “since a god is good, he is not—as most people claim—the cause of everything that happens to human beings but of only a few things, for good things are fewer than bad ones in our lives.”84 socrates goes on to state that “poets must look for the kind of account of [the gods] that we are now seeking, and say that the actions of the gods are good and just, and that those they punish are benefited thereby.”85 here, socrates’ two main points about the gods are 1) that they are truly good and therefore reward justice and punish injustice, and 2), that, since they are good, they should not be held accountable for the bad that befalls humans. naturally, socrates must uphold these principles in his own dialogue, especially since he maintains that the poets should uphold them, since in a way his dialogue is poetic. this is why, after playing “devil’s advocate,” and assuming that the gods will not reward justice and punish injustice, socrates corrects this view through the myth of er. indeed, in the myth of er itself, socrates demonstrates his adherence to the two main points about the gods that he makes in this discussion of poetry in book ii. to the first point—that the gods reward justice and punish injustice—evidence abounds. the overall sentiment of the myth is that, with annas’ objections countered, the punishments and rewards doled out by the gods do, in fact, have meaning for the dead: for each in turn of the unjust things they had done and for each in turn of the people they had wronged, they paid the penalty ten times over, once in every century of their journey. [...] but if they had done good deeds 82 ibid. 83 johnson, “plato’s ‘myth of er’,” 4. 84 plato, republic, 379c. 85 ibid., 380b-c. 79issue v f spring 2018 a defense of the gods and had become just and pious, they were rewarded according to the same scale.86 the totally incorrigible receive their just punishment as well, and are “thrown into tartarus” for eternity.87 socrates also upholds the second point—that the gods should not be blamed for the bad that befalls humans. this is demonstrated by the souls who select their next lives. “a speaker,” socrates says, relates the clear message that “the responsibility lies with the one who makes the choice; the god has none.”88 again, with annas’ objection (that we retain no control over which lives we choose to live) refuted, socrates’ message seems clear: the gods must not be blamed for the bad that befalls one (at least not as a result of his or her own choices). it is clear, then, that as the myth of er stands in symmetrical opposition to book i,89 its primary aim is not to conclude the dialogue, but is, rather, to restore to it the truth, introduced in book i, that the gods really are good and just, thus vindicating the gods from what they were accused of for the sake of the dialogue’s argument. this is done in accordance with socrates’ principles that articulate how poets should represent the gods. giving further support to the idea that socrates really wants to convey this fundamental truth about the gods through the myth is josef pieper’s analysis in the platonic myths. pieper first defines truly mythical stories as having three characteristics: 1) they must deal with action taking place between humans and the gods, 2) they must be not totally expressible through speech, and, 3) they must be authored by someone other than their narrator.90 pieper quotes a passage from the timaeus: “we have to believe” the tellers of myths, those who “have certain knowledge handed down to them from their ancestors.”91 pieper notes that though myth sometimes uses “symbolic speech”92 to convey the truth of things that humans cannot grasp in their entirety, such myths can still be “accepted by man as valid beyond all doubt—as truth which, while not the absolute truth, is the ultimate attainable truth.”93 in other words, myths are always, in a sense, false. they, however, reveal underlying truths about reality. at the same time, a “critique of myth” is to be found in plato because socrates never subscribes to “undiscriminating, uncritically naive acceptance of what is handed down” through myth.94 indeed, pieper says that “defend[ing] the truth about the gods as it is revealed in legitimate sacred tradition [...] defines plato’s most genuine aim. this becomes completely clear in the second book of the republic,”95 as was discussed above. pieper thus analyzes the myth of er: 86 ibid., 615a-b. 87 ibid., 616a. 88 ibid., 617d-e. 89 friedlander, plato: an introduction, 184. 90 josef pieper, the platonic myths, trans. dan farrelly (south bend: st. augustine’s press, 2011), 9-11. 91 plato, timaeus, 40d, quoted in pieper, the platonic myths, 44. 92 pieper, the platonic myths, 47. 93 ibid., 48. 94 ibid., 50. 95 ibid., 51-52. 80 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college when faced, for example, with the hopelessness of homeric expectations for the afterlife which we sense in the despairing cry of achilles, plato does not counter with a philosophical argument but expressly with the inviolable truth of the eschatological myth.96 in other words, socrates’ aim in the myth of er is to demonstrate that the gods are good. according to pieper, the myths have not been authored by their narrators (they have been handed down). thus, the final question is of where the myths and the universal truths they convey ultimately originated. ultimately, pieper, a christian, points to god’s own revelation.97 it is clear, then, that the purpose of the myth of er in plato’s republic is not chiefly to summarize the main argument of the republic, but is, rather, to convey the ultimate truth that, contrary to the poets, and to the assumption made at the beginning of the dialogue, the gods do reward justice and punish injustice because they are fundamentally good. f biblography annas, julia. “plato’s myths of judgement.” phronesis 27, no. 2 (1982): 119-43. http://www.jstor.org/stable/4182147. friedlander, paul. plato: an introduction. translated by hans meyerhoff. princeton: princeton university press, 1969. inwood, michael. “plato’s eschatological myths.” in plato’s myths, edited by catalin partenie, 28-50. new york: cambridge university press, 2009. johnson, ronald r. “does plato’s ‘myth of er’ contribute to the argument of the ‘republic’?” philosophy & rhetoric 32, no. 1 (1999): 1-13. http://www.jstor.org/ stable/40238014. pieper, josef. the platonic myths. translated by dan farrelly. south bend: st. augustine’s press, 2011. plato. republic. edited by c. d.c. reeve. translated by g. m. a. grube. 2nd ed. indianapolis: hackett, 1992. sallis, john. being and logos: reading the platonic dialogues. 3rd ed. bloomington: indiana university press, 1996. 96 ibid., 54. 97 ibid., 60-61. 61issue vi ◆ spring 2019 δι αν οι α 61 walter benjamin's [über den begriff der geschichte] and the marxist tradition maxwell wade walter benjamin’s “on the concept of history” has long puzzled readers due to its eclectic and novel theses that call into question orthodox understandings of religion, marxism, and historical progress. many readings have emphasized the feeling of rupture throughout the text, treating it as an intense break with his prior intellectual commitments,1 a political and theoretical “dark night of the soul” at the end of benjamin’s life. elements of the text certainly support this reading, and many interpreters, such as gershom scholem,2 take this text as a clear-cut rejection of benjamin’s prior marxism. in what follows, i aim to push back against this trend in scholarship and argue that “on the concept of history” can be understood as an attempt to move benjamin’s thought in a new direction, while still remaining faithful to radical political traditions and much of his earlier thought. i will begin by looking at various attempts to make sense of benjamin that fall short of adequately dealing with the nuances of the text. i will then analyze the theses themselves in an attempt to read them in tandem with other key texts from the marxist tradition, and will use that method to make sense of the political implications of “on the concept of history.” 1 wilde, marc de. “benjamin's politics of remembrance: a reading of ‘über den begriff der geschichte’.” a companion to the works of walter benjamin. ed. rolf j. goebel. rochester, ny: camden house, 2009. 177. 2 beiner, ronald. "walter benjamin's philosophy of history." political theory 12, no. 3 (1984): 423-434. 62 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college perhaps one of the most basic difficulties in benjamin scholarship with “on the concept of history” is the plethora of interpretations around it, many of which contradict each other. scholars frequently reach radically different conclusions about the meaning of the work and its place within benjamin’s thought, and consensus on this issue seems impossible. part of this difficulty, i believe, is rooted in an understanding of marxism and religion as intrinsically opposed or adversarial (it is no wonder benjamin’s audience would be left scratching its head at such a strange blending of jewish mysticism and radical politics). rainer nägele, for example, thinks that “benjamin was compelled to make a paradoxical turn, or umschlag, from politics to religion and this had to do with his psychology.”3 but it is not clear to me where the paradox lies in this turn, unless we are to take it that religion and politics are like oil and water, absolutely incapable of intermixing. others have even considered this text to represent a kind of melancholic neurosis in benjamin’s psyche,4 thereby completely domesticating, under the pretense of psychologism, many complicated or challenging insights in the text. being charitable, one might say that these psychological readings are able to give some insight into the conflicts and tensions that gave rise to such a unique and polarizing text. but they neglect the implications of the text itself, merely treating its content as such a theoretical oddity that it must be filed away under the category of “paradox” or “neurosis.” other interpretive frameworks for the theses seem to fare no better. as marc de wilde explains: the metaphor of the dwarf in the chess machine, which identifies the relation between historical materialism and theology as among the main philosophical stakes of benjamin’s theses, has prompted a debate between, on the one hand, scholars inspired by marxism who, in the wake of bertolt brecht’s observation that “the small work is clear and illuminating (despite its metaphors and judaisms),” emphasize the importance of historical materialism at the expense of theology, and, on the other hand, cultural theorists who, following in the footsteps of gershom scholem, emphasize the work’s “deep connections with theology,” claiming that “[often] nothing remains of historical materialism but the word.”5 both interpretative camps end up pursuing a certain method in their reading that emphasizes one aspect of the text at the expense of another. either marxism is given centrality while theology is pushed aside, or the opposite happens, and theology becomes the only relevant theme in the text. i agree with wilde’s assessment that “these interpretations, though not untrue, are one-sided.”6 they are founded on the same theoretical premise that axiomatically positions religion and marxism as 3 rapaport, herman. "benjamin as historian." clio 36, no. 3 (2007): 396. 4 ibid., 397. 5 wilde, “remembrance,” 180. 6 ibid., 181. 63issue vi ◆ spring 2019 walter benjamin's [über den begriff der geschichte] intrinsically opposed, with the coexistence of these two intellectual currents being taken as an oddity or abnormality. if marxism and mysticism are being talked about together in such a way that they are influencing or supplementing each other, the orthodox critic—either jewish or marxist—reacts immunologically against the “contamination” of their tradition by an outside influence. the orthodox marxist readers, à la brecht, are forced to jump through hoops to explain away the dominant messianic themes as either incidental or mere parables.7 the “cultural theorists,” conversely, take this text as an expression of jewish religiosity that only incidentally has similarities to radical political thought. these readings place ideological purity over textual fidelity to the point of incoherence, and in doing so, distort benjamin’s message that these theses “[do] not designate the precedence of one of these concepts over the other but rather points to their independence.”8 benjamin challenges his readers to rethink the relationship between marxism and religion, and unfortunately it seems that many have failed to live up to this task. of course, i speak to more than just the interplay between marxism and religion. readers have rightly pointed out from the start that benjamin’s reconceptualization of time and his subsequent rejection of progress, as well as his messianism and notions of redeeming the past, are all generally anathema to what is normally taken as the standard premises of marxist thought. if progressive teleology, future-oriented history, and a rejection of religious sentiment all constitute the theoretical core of marxism,9 then perhaps it is true that benjamin here is making a break with tradition. however, a close examination of both “on the concept of history” and selections from marx and engels will serve to complicate this picture, showing how benjamin is engaged in a project that seeks to bring back to the foreground certain elements in marx’s work that were glossed over by later readers in favor of a simpler, more “systematic” and uncomplicated marxism. first and foremost, we must turn our attention to benjamin’s reconceptualization of time. time is an overarching theme throughout the text and remains a crucial point of focus for benjamin’s attack. the metaphysics of time—how we conceptualize our place within history, and how time is treated politically are all intertwined, and 7 “according to tiedemann, even explicitly theological concepts in benjamin’s theses, such as ‘the messiah, redemption, the angel, and the antichrist,’ are thus merely to be taken as ‘images, analogies, and parables, and not in their real form.’” ibid. 8 ibid. 9 the label of “marxism” itself has a complicated and interesting history, especially since marx himself famously rejected the “marxism” of his contemporaries, saying “what is certain is that i myself am not a marxist.” the philologist michael heinrich takes this to mean marx was engaged in a constantly changing critical project, rather than a “rigid science” found in later leninist-inspired readers. this makes it quite difficult to pin down an “essence” of marxism or marxist thought, especially given the theoretical nuances of marx’s writing. a main point of this paper will be to problematize the notion of a singular or unified “marxism,” and instead look to see the ways in which benjamin, like other “unorthodox” thinkers, can still work within the tradition. see heinrich, michael. “je ne suis pas marxiste.” neues deutschland, january 24, 2015. accessed december 11, 2018. https:// www.neues-deutschland.de/artikel/959492.je-ne-suis-pas-marxiste.html. full english translation available at https://libcom.org/library/%e2%80%9eje-ne-suis-pas-marxiste%e2%80%9c. 64 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college “on the concept of history” —starts by interrogating a certain unifying concept of time that is dominant in our present historical epoch. the common notion of time in the modern capitalist era is one of “progression through a homogenous, empty time,”10 which is the primary mode of thought that serves as the basic conceptual framework of the past, present, and future. formally articulated by “positivist historians” like eduard meyer,11 this way of thinking about history rose to dominate the academic study of history and reflects the material changes that have occurred under capitalism. tied in with the development of new technologies used to subjugate both humanity and nature, this shift in thinking about time is a new development in consciousness (though it is surely one that has “corrupted the german working class” more than anything else).12 yet, unlike his earlier works in which historical or technological development would at least open up a new space of freedom, this progressivist historicism seems like pure illusion, an ideological deadend. for example, the innovation of the photograph is “the first truly revolutionary means of reproduction […which] for the first time in world history, technological reproducibility emancipates the work of art from its parasitic subservience to ritual.” 13 this apparent break with the dialectical understanding of technological progress that guided his historical work would surely constitute a break with benjamin’s prior marxism if it were the case. however, dialectical tensions are still deeply present within the theses. for all of the polemics against the universal history of historicism, benjamin also admits that “universal histories are not inevitably reactionary. a universal history without a structural [konstruktiv] principle is reactionary. the structural principle of universal history allows it to be presented in partial histories.”14 universal history “has no theoretical armature”15—no structure that lets it express the historical particular—and because of this it will produce reactionary tendencies. in this sense, universal history is an unmoored idealistic fantasy: “a kind of esperanto.”16 so, while it is true that “historicism rightly culminates in universal history,”17 it is not universal history that is itself the problem. in fact, it seems that the development of a universal history is a partial movement, one that is as of yet unfulfilled by bourgeois positivism. a true universal history is messianic in nature, as “the messianic world is the world of universal and integral actuality. only in the messianic realm does a 10 benjamin, “on the concept of history,” in benjamin, walter. selected writings, volume 4, 1938-1940. edited by howard eiland and michael w. jennings. cambridge [ma] and london: belknap press (2003), 395. 11 ibid., 401. 12 ibid., 393. 13 benjamin, “the work of art in the age of its mechanical reproducibility” (1936-1939), in benjamin, walter. selected writings, volume 4, 1938-1940. edited by howard eiland and michael w. jennings. cambridge [ma] and london: belknap press (2003), 256. a similar example is film, which “enriched our field of perception… by its use of close ups, by its accentuation of hidden details in familiar objects, and by its exploration of commonplace milieux through the ingenious guidance of the camera.” ibid., 265. 14 benjamin, “history,” 404. 15 ibid. 16 ibid. 17 ibid., 396 65issue vi ◆ spring 2019 walter benjamin's [über den begriff der geschichte] universal history exist.”18 universal history “comes too early” and does not tether itself to the historical materialist framework that can properly give it meaning. this ambivalent dialectical tension within universal history indicates that benjamin fully recognizes that there is a glimmer of freedom being opened up within progressivism. yes, it is woefully destructive, but within that destruction is an element that points toward a redemptive, utopian vision. here, a natural parallel to marx emerges: the bourgeoisie, wherever it has got the upper hand, has put an end to all feudal, patriarchal, idyllic relations…in one word, for exploitation, veiled by religious and political illusions, it has substituted naked, shameless, direct brutal exploitation…all that is solid melts into air, all that is holy is profaned, and man is at last compelled to face with sober senses, his real conditions of life, and his relations with his kind.19 marx, like benjamin, is no stranger to the horrors of progress, yet the horror likewise opens up a new clarity and vision of an unalienated world. like the change in the structure of experience that allows for humanity to be able to “face with sober senses” the exploitation they experience, the change in our historical understanding of time and the past compels one to rethink universal history in a genuine, messianic light.20 much like the previous case of universal history, benjamin’s idea of messianic time has also confounded many scholars (and not just due to its intentionally religious language). in thesis a, benjamin speaks about historicism as “content[ing] itself with establishing a causal nexus among various moments in history […] the historian who proceeds from this consideration […] tell[s] the sequence of events like the beads of a rosary,” i.e., one after the other.21 benjamin critiques this precisely because it fails to grasp history as a meaning-giving endeavor: “no state of affairs having causal significance is for that very reason historical. it became historical posthumously, as it were, through events that may be separated from it by thousands of years.”22 the historicist wrongly treats history as a series of events, and, in doing so, fails to realize that events only become historical in retrospect when we reflect upon them and situate their significance in world history. 18 ibid., 404. 19 karl marx, manifesto of the communist party, in: the marx-engels reader, ed. robert c. tucker (new york: norton, 1972) 473-474. 20 it seems reasonable as well to draw a parallel here with the “change in the structure of experience” benjamin speaks about in his essay on baudelaire. here too there is a loss, a death of a certain aesthetic style, but in this experience of loss there is a new distance created with which one can view history, or in this case, poetry, in a new light. see benjamin, “on some motifs in baudelaire” (1939), in benjamin, walter. selected writings, volume 4, 1938-1940. edited by howard eiland and michael w. jennings. cambridge [ma] and london: belknap press (2003), 313-55. 21 benjamin, “history,” 397. 22 ibid. 66 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college this was not a point lost on marx. in his preface of the contribution to the critique of political economy, marx writes that: the bourgeois mode of production is the last antagonistic form of the social process of production – antagonistic not in the sense of individual antagonism but of an antagonism that emanates from the individuals' social conditions of existence – but the productive forces developing within bourgeois society create also the material conditions for a solution of this antagonism. the prehistory of human society accordingly closes with this social formation.23 this passage begins with the standard marxian understanding of capitalism as that which generates its own conditions of abolition from within. indeed, though the final portion of the quote is the most noteworthy: all of human “history” is mere prehistory up to and including the present. we are living in a prehistorical epoch and only with communism can history truly begin. this is a radically benjaminian point, to put it in an intentionally anachronistic way, as the past only gains its meaning when viewed through the lens of the utopian messianic time—a time so radically different that it cannot be on the same historical continuum as that which came before. one can likewise read this passage together with another thesis by benjamin: only when the course of historical events runs through the historian’s hands smoothly, like a thread, can one speak of progress. if, however, it is a frayed bundle unraveling into a thousand strands that hang down like unplaited hair, none of them has a definite place until they are all gathered up and braided into a coiffure.24 mapping marx’s schema onto this passage, we can speak of human “prehistory,” (i.e., all hitherto existing class societies) as the “frayed bundle unreeling into a thousand strands,” a mismatched collection of disparate events without meaning or cohesion. however, the communist moment is that which gathers up these historical strands and unifies them into a universal history. only then can we speak of progress or of genuine history.25 this discussion is valuable because it us can help make sense of benjamin’s call to redeem the past and how it can relate to marxism. simply stated, communism is the movement to redeem the past and set history right. benjamin openly and explicitly explores this theme, first with the idea that “there is a secret agreement between past 23 marx, karl. a contribution to the critique of political economy. translated by s. w. ryazanskaya. (moscow: progress, 1977). accessed from https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1859/critique-pol-economy/index. htm. italics added 24 benjamin, “history,” 403. 25 some interpreters may contest this reading of benjamin on the grounds that this passage from new theses c is arguing for the structural impossibility of history to run smoothly, therefore indicating the ultimate impossibility of progress. in this case, the comparison with marx is invalid. however, given benjamin’s other comments on the messianic nature of a (true) universal history, it seems quite coherent to suggest that a redeemed history is one in which time can finally progress without catastrophe or fragmentation. 67issue vi ◆ spring 2019 walter benjamin's [über den begriff der geschichte] generations and the present one” that “endowed [us] with a weak messianic power.”26 this connection between the past and present establishes a historical continuity in which messianic power is importantly not something that comes from the outside, as in more orthodox theological conceptions, but rather is something possessed by humanity. mankind has the power to redeem itself—to “succeed in ridding itself of all the muck of ages”27—thereby transforming the past. the past is transformed precisely because, as benjamin puts it, class struggle “has effects that reach far back into the past. they constantly call into question every victory, past and present, of the rulers.”28 a successful communist revolution means that the blood and suffering of past revolutions were not in vain and that the lives of all revolutionaries, past and present, have contributed to the same final goal. benjamin recognizes that this has been at work within the more radical strands of marxism, as the proletariat is “the avenger that completes the task of liberation in the name of generations of the downtrodden. this conviction, which had a brief resurgence in the spartacist league, has always been objectionable to social democrats.”29 the choice of the name of the spartacist league is of course not incidental, but is rather a form of remembrance and continuity that reaches back into the past. the revolting proletarians in germany share the same lineage and connection with the slave revolts of ancient rome, in the same way that “to robespierre, ancient rome was a past charged with now-time, a past which he blasted out of the continuum of history. the french revolution viewed itself as rome reincarnate.”30 benjamin rightly points out the ways in which truly radical movements have challenged oppression precisely through their shared identification with past struggles, rather than an attempt to redeem future generations.31 redemption of the past is intrinsically tied to historical memory and a sense of shared struggle with prior movements, and this, too, existed in the works of marx and engels. perhaps the best and most striking example of this comes from engels’ the peasant war in germany, in which he examines the peasant revolts of the 16th century not merely as a discrete and isolated historical event, but as something that still bears connections and inspiration for revolutionary movements of his time. he writes with great admiration for the radical mystic thomas müntzer: only in the teachings of muenzer did these communist notions find expression as the desires of a vital section of society. through him they were formulated with a certain definiteness, and were afterwards found in every great convulsion of the people, until gradually they merged with the 26 ibid., 390. 27 karl marx, the german ideology, in: the marx-engels reader, ed. robert c. tucker (new york: norton, 1972) 193. 28 benjamin, “history,” 390. 29 ibid., 394. 30 ibid., 395. 31 ibid., 394. 68 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college modern proletarian movement…his political programme touched upon communism, and there is more than one communist sect of modern times which, on the eve of the february revolution, did not possess a theoretical equipment as rich as that of muenzer of the sixteenth century.32 this passage may surprise some readers, as the stereotype of marx and engels as militant atheist arch-materialists still persists. yet, the identification with religious mysticism as a revolutionary force runs throughout the text, and engels sees the revolutionary movements of the medieval period as being fundamentally of the same nature as proletarian movements in his time.33 another example of this is how “[marx and engels] shared hegel's high esteem for the sixteenth century german mystic and heretic jacob boehme, saluted by marx in the rheinische zeitung in 1842 as ‘a great philosopher.’”34 here, too, we see the positive appraisal of mysticism by marx and engels, particularly in the sense that mystical thinkers were able to glean great insights into politics and philosophy, perhaps even to the extent that “secular” thinkers were not capable of. finding these themes in marx requires a little more digging; his job as a journalist often meant that most of his time was spent writing about the present, not just past revolutions in antiquity. in recent decades, however, more attention has been paid to marx’s ethnological notebooks, and scholars like franklin rosemont and kevin anderson have sought to explore the ways in which marx saw revolutionary potential in premodern and non-western social arrangements. additionally, marx was fascinated throughout his life by past societies and their relevance for communism, developing a deep fascination with the iroquois confederacy and the ways in which this society serves as an alternative mode of life to capitalism. his anthropological notes reveal that “it was not only iroquois social organization, however, that appealed to him, but rather a whole way of life sharply counter-posed, all along the line, to modern industrial civilization.”35 another example of this can be found in his studies of russia, which focus on the ways in which the communal lifestyle of the peasantry can provide an alternative pathway than capitalism. in his letter to zasulich, marx writes that “his recent studies of russian society had ‘convinced me that the commune is the fulcrum for a social regeneration in russia.’”36 equally relevant is his comment in the preface to the russian edition of the communist manifesto, wherein he posits 32 engels, friedrich. the peasant war in germany. (moscow: progress publishers, 1969). 30, 37. 33 likewise, it is important to note how engels admired utopian religious communities as excellent examples of communism. for example, “in 1844 we find engels writing sympathetically of american shaker communities, which he argued, proved that ‘communism... is not only possible but has actually already been realized.’” rosemont, franklin. karl marx & the iroquois. (red balloon collective, 1992). 5. 34 ibid., 6. 35 ibid., 14. 36 anderson, kevin b., "marx's late writings on non-western and precapitalist societies and gender," in rethinking marxism 14, no. 4 (2002): 89. 69issue vi ◆ spring 2019 walter benjamin's [über den begriff der geschichte] that “russia’s peasant communal land-ownership may serve as the point of departure for a communist development.”37 these passages are illuminating precisely because they point to a strand of marx’s thinking that emphatically rejects the blind progressivism that benjamin is critiquing in his theses. marx is neither shrugging off the suffering caused by capitalism as a historical inevitability nor is he treating communism as a far-off world of the future. rather, he is searching for alternative developmental paths for the world to take and looking at ways in which communal, egalitarian lifestyles are present in the world at the time of his writing. the great irony is that at the very moment that his russian "disciples" those "admirers of capitalism," as he ironically tagged them were loudly proclaiming that the laws of historical development set forth in the first volume of capital were universally mandatory, marx himself was diving headlong into the study of (for him) new experiences of resistance and revolt against oppression by north american indians, australian aborigines, egyptians and russian peasants.38 this leaves us with new view of marx that is more in line with benjamin’s perspective. not only are marx and engels deeply interested in the historical continuity between their struggle and past movements, but they also engage with many of the same philosophical issues as well. challenging simplistic notions of historical progress, as well as grounding communism as an immanent human reality, results in a marxism that harmonizes—rather than clash—with benjamin’s most radical theses.39 this understanding can also help shed light on the notorious passage from thesis xviia, in which benjamin writes that “marx says that revolutions are the locomotive of world history. but perhaps it is quite otherwise. perhaps revolutions are an attempt by the passengers on this train—namely, the human race—to activate the emergency brake.”40 on the face of it, this seems radically conservative, rather than revolutionary, intimating that the point of revolution is an attempt to stop history where it is and bring things to a standstill, presumably to prevent further decay. yet, it seems quite plausible to read marxian strands here, despite the openly critical attitude benjamin takes toward him in this section. reading the two together, one can take the idea that “the history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class 37 marx, karl, and frederick engels. "preface to the manifesto of the communist party." marxist internet archive. accessed december 13, 2018. https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ preface.htm. 38 rosemont, “iroquois,” 30. 39 it is important to note, of course, that it is unlikely (or in some cases, impossible) that benjamin had read all of these texts from marx and engels’ corpus. in many ways, their philosophical convergence on some of the same issues and themes points toward the fact that all three thinkers were dealing with many of the same philosophical dilemmas and reached similar conclusions. 40 benjamin, “history,” 402. 70 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college struggles”41 is the locomotive of what benjamin calls “world history.” this world history is mere prehistory for marx, however, as genuine history has not yet begun, and communist society with its abolition of the division of labor42 will bring about history in earnest. therefore, if class struggle is the locomotive of (pre)history, then it is perfectly coherent to speak about communist revolution as an emergency brake: with the abolition of class society, there is no more “motor” to drive history and “world history” is brought to an end. benjamin expresses this end of history as a messianic time, a wholly new state of consciousness, and marx, too, understands communism as a vision in which mankind reaches a new, unalienated consciousness. in his reading of this passage, the contemporary philosopher benjamin noys proposes a reading that reaches similar conclusions: the conclusion is that the emergency brake is not merely calling to a halt for the sake of it, some static stopping at a particular point in capitalist history (say swedish social democracy – which the american republican right now takes as the true horror of ‘socialism’). neither is it a return back to some utopian pre-capitalist moment, which would fall foul of marx and engels’s anathemas against ‘feudal socialism’. rather, benjamin argues that: ‘classless society is not the final goal of historical progress but its frequently miscarried, ultimately [endlich] achieved interruption.’ we interrupt to prevent catastrophe, we destroy the tracks to prevent the greater destruction of acceleration.43 this analysis is particularly apt in the way that it recognizes that the pulling of the emergency brake signals not only a rethinking of the kind of historical progression that we are experiencing, but also a radical attempt to break with the whole history of class society. noys likewise focuses in on a clever double-entendre with break/ brake, as “benjamin’s interruption suggests a more definitive break (or brake) with the aim of production. the stopping of the angelic locomotive tries to jump the tracks of history, or jump out of the vision of history as infinite waiting for the revolutionary situation.”44 this “jump” out of history is, after all, “the dialectical leap marx understood as revolution.”45 in fact, even within this same thesis (xviia), benjamin acknowledges the insight made by marx in this regard. he begins by saying that “in the idea of classless society, marx secularized the idea of messianic time. and that was a good thing.”46 he is, in a very clear way, acknowledging his intellectual indebtedness to marx—something not really plausible when one considers this text his “break” with marxism—and sees 41 marx, manifesto, 473. italics added. 42 marx, german ideology, 160. 43 noys, benjamin. malign velocities: accelerationism and capitalism. (lanham: john hunt publishing, 2014) 63. 44 ibid. 45 benjamin, “history,” 395. 46 ibid., 401. 71issue vi ◆ spring 2019 walter benjamin's [über den begriff der geschichte] the error as rooted in the social democrats’ elevation of this to an abstract, idealistic principle.47 not only does this emphasize that the problem only began with the social democrats (not marx, who therefore has a correct, or at least unproblematic, understanding of classless society), but he also indicates the ways in which benjamin remains loyal to a materialist outlook that rejects elevating one’s political goals into an unreachable “infinite task.” this move toward abstraction is closely tied with the “empty and homogenous time” spoken of earlier, as “once the classless society had been transformed into an infinite task, the empty and homogenous time was transformed into an anteroom, so to speak, in which one could wait for the emergence of the revolutionary situation with more or less equanimity.”48 returning to marx, we again can see two resonant parallels between the two thinkers. the simplistic, reductionist (but unfortunately commonplace) reading of marx would take him as placing communism in a far-off and distant future, maintaining that future-oriented stance that benjamin so aggressively critiques in this text. likewise, another common misreading of marx takes communism as yet another political ideology, an idealistic framework that needs to be imposed on society from the outside. yet, marx explicitly states otherwise in the german ideology, wherein he famously writes that “communism is for us not a state of affairs which is to be established, an ideal to which reality [will] have to adjust itself. we call communism the real movement which abolishes the present state of things.”49 the abstract as a political goal is rejected precisely because it forces reality to conform to it and is, therefore, an arbitrary and alien imposition on the world that is unmoored from its material conditions. like benjamin, there is a rejection of the future tense: the misunderstandings of communism are both that which is “to be,” while true communism is squarely focused on the present state of things. it is focused on the here and now, and its power lies precisely in its immanence to the world as it is. communism is not external or foreign, but rather is “the real movement,” i.e., the movement that actually exists in the world as it is right now. when benjamin speaks about classless society as “frequently miscarried,”50 it still means the world is still “pregnant” with communism, much in the same way that marx sees “the conditions of [the] movement result[ing] from the premises now in existence.”51 this immanence is even more clearly explicated in his notion of messianic time, which shoots the present moment like splinters.52 likewise, “every second was the small gateway in time through which the messiah might enter.”53 these numerous passages all point toward a conception of utopia that is radically immanent 47 “it was only when the social democrats elevated this idea to an ‘ideal’ that the trouble began.” ibid. 48 ibid., 402. 49 marx, german ideology, 162. 50 benjamin, “history,” 402. 51 marx, german ideology, 162. 52 benjamin, “history,” 397. 53 ibid. 72 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college in its temporality, framing the revolutionary break as something that can happen at any time, which is not contingent upon some sort of “historical development” that justifies the exploitation and suffering leading up to it. therefore, we can take “on the concept of history” as representing an attempt to synthesize the systematic and utopian tendencies within marxism and bring it together into a unified whole. historical materialism, as a rational and systematic historical framework, understands the role of class struggle and revolution, while messianism, as the utopian dream of redemption and salvation, recognizes the immanence of this radical change and the need to redeem the past from its suffering. both serve as meaning-giving structures that help one understand the past and present, but not in such a way that resorts back to bourgeois historicism and positivist historiography. the two elements not only complement each other, but they also exert mutual influence in their coexistence, working together to provide a proper political program that can bring about this shattering of time and redemption of the world that benjamin writes about. ultimately, the text should be understood neither as a rejection of the marxist tradition, nor as an attempt to add a seemingly foreign element—religion—into the theoretical mixture. rather, benjamin is drawing on what is already latent in the text, and casts it in a new light, in order to draw attention to it and to cause readers to reevaluate their ossified, overly rigid notions of marxism and revolution. it is a corrective measure against the failings and shortcomings of the social democrats that have ruined the workers’ movement and have let fascism triumph. it is precisely for this reason that this text needs to be understood in continuity with what has come before. benjamin is working to redeem marxism and salvage the messianic sparks hidden within, all while remaining loyal to what has come before. ◆ 73issue vi ◆ spring 2019 walter benjamin's [über den begriff der geschichte] bibliography anderson, kevin b., "marx's late writings on non-western and precapitalist societies and gender," in rethinking marxism 14, no. 4 (2002). beiner, ronald. "walter benjamin's philosophy of history." political theory 12, no. 3 (1984): 423-434. benjamin, andrew. walter benjamin and history. a&c black, 2005. benjamin, walter. “on the concept of history,” in benjamin, walter. selected writings, volume 4, 1938-1940. edited by howard eiland and michael w. jennings. cambridge [ma] and london: belknap press (2003). benjamin, walter. “on some motifs in baudelaire” (1939), in benjamin, walter. selected writings, volume 4, 1938-1940. edited by howard eiland and michael w. jennings. cambridge [ma] and london: belknap press (2003) benjamin, walter. “the work of art in the age of its mechanical reproducibility” (1936-1939), in benjamin, walter. selected writings, volume 4, 1938-1940. edited by howard eiland and michael w. jennings. cambridge [ma] and london: belknap press (2003) engels, friedrich. the peasant war in germany. moscow: progress publishers, 1969. heinrich, michael. “je ne suis pas marxiste.” neues deutschland, january 24, 2015. accessed december 11, 2018. löwy, michael. fire alarm: reading walter benjamin's ‘on the concept of history’. verso, 2005. löwy, michael. "fire alarm: walter benjamin’s critique of technology." in democratic theory and technological society, pp. 271-279. routledge, 2017. löwy, michael. "walter benjamin and marxism." monthly review 46, no. 9 (1995): 11-20. marx, karl. a contribution to the critique of political economy. translated by s. w. ryazanskaya. moscow: progress, 1977. marx, karl. the german ideology, in: the marx-engels reader, ed. robert c. tucker. new york: norton, 1972. marx, karl. manifesto of the communist party, in: the marx-engels reader, ed. robert c. tucker. new york: norton, 1972. marx, karl, and frederick engels. "preface to the manifesto of the communist party." marxist internet archive. accessed december 13, 2018. noys, benjamin. malign velocities: accelerationism and capitalism. lanham: john hunt publishing, 2014. 74 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college rapaport, herman. "benjamin as historian." clio 36, no. 3 (2007): 391-409. rosemont, franklin. “karl marx & the iroquois”. red balloon collective, 1992. smith, chadwick. "walter benjamin: images, the creaturely, and the holy." (2013). smith, cyril. karl marx and the future of the human. lexington books, 2005. steinberg, michael p., ed. walter benjamin and the demands of history. cornell university press, 1996. wilde, marc de. “benjamin's politics of remembrance: a reading of ‘über den begriff der geschichte’.” a companion to the works of walter benjamin. ed. rolf j. goebel. rochester, ny: camden house, 2009. editor in chief: thomas lombardo, ‘17 managing editors: peter klapes ‘19, jordan pino ‘17 senior editors: myles casey ‘17, laura mclaughlin ‘17, jianing wu ‘17 general editors: bernadette darcy ‘19, jen howard ‘19, gregory kacergis ‘19, alex kerker ‘18 layout design editor: courtney timmins ‘17 faculty advisor: ronald tacelli, s.j. the editors of dianoia would like to express their gratitude to the following individuals for their generous support: eileen sweeney, department of philosophy ronald tacelli, s.j., department of philosophy cover designs courtesy of courtney timmins. all rights reserved. featuring: (metropolitan museum of art, new york, ny) solis, virgil. philosophy enthroned. mid-16th century. kandinsky, vasily. rain landscape. 1911. kandinsky, vasily. four parts. 1932. the materials herein represent the personal opinions of the individual authors and do not necessarily represent the views of dianoia or boston college. if you have questions regarding the journal or would like to submit your work for review, or if you’d be interested in joining next year’s staff, please contact the journal at dianoia@bc.edu. dianoia the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college spring 2017 issue iv boston college 140 commonwealth avenue chestnut hill, ma 02467 www.bc.edu/schools/cas/philosophy/undergrad-program/dianoia.html printed by progressive print solutions © 2017 the trustees of boston college 5issue iv f spring 2017 spring 2017 dear reader, after a three-year hiatus, we are pleased to release issue iv of dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college. the front cover hosts virgil solis’ philosophy enthroned, while the back cover features kandinsky’s rain landscape as well as his four parts. we thought it fitting to give such a prominent position to lady philosophy and to her great servants: albert the great, virgil, ptolemy, and plato. though none of these philosophers are specifically the focus of any of the essays contained herein, each of them has served philosophy in a distinct and lasting manner. much like those aforementioned, the philosophers referenced in this collection of essays have made their own unique contribution to the pursuit of wisdom. similarly, the authors of these essays have inherited this great tradition, adding to it their own perspective and distinct style. the pairing of solis’ woodcutting with kandinsky’s work attempts to illustrate this continuity of philosophy’s reign; the essays touch on a wide range of thinkers — from thomas aquinas to jimi hendrix — and are indebted to the contributions of the abovementioned philosophical giants. each serves as a testament to the love of wisdom. in raising dianoia from its short slumber, the editorial board ambitiously decided to expand the scope of the journal beyond the walls of boston college, soliciting papers from other colleges and universities for the first time in its history. as a result, we received several dozen high quality submissions from elite colleges and universities across the united states and even the united kingdom. we thank each of these authors for his or her hard work. from this pool, we are pleased to publish seven essays that we believe not only exemplify the pinnacle of undergraduate philosophical research, but also take as their focus topics that would be of interest to a general undergraduate audience. it is our hope that these works will contribute to dialogue in classrooms and on campuses around the world. we are greatly indebted to those members of the boston college philosophy department and the greater boston college community who have helped to make the revival of dianoia possible, and we thank you for your continued support. we hope that you enjoy reading the essays that follow, and, in the hope of creating continued discourse, encourage the submission of essays in response to those here contained for future issues of dianoia. sincerely, thomas j. lombardo, editor-in-chief peter g. klapes, managing editor jordan a. pino, managing editor a l e t t e r f r o m t h e e d it o r s 104 the editorial staff of dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college would like to extend our sincerest thanks to the following individuals for their assistance in making this issue of dianoia possible: nancy adams, bc libraries margaret bakalo, philosophy/lonergan center mary crane, institute for the liberal arts rosemarie deleo, philosophy susan dunn, center for centers rev. gary gurtler, s.j., philosophy stephen jarjoura, information technology services peter marnino, center for centers jane morris, bc libraries michelle muccini, center for centers paula perry, philosophy catherine wechsler, media technology services we would like to extend a very special thank you to eileen sweeney of b.c.’s philosophy department for her continued support and her encouragement to restart dianoia after having gone out of print for several years and to rev. ronald tacelli, s.j., also of b.c. philosophy, for his invaluable assistance as our faculty advisor. acknowledgements 43issue v f spring 2018 δι αν οι α the representational fallacy and the ontology of time jazlyn cartaya i. introduction in metaphysics and the representational fallacy, heather dyke, notices that while most work in contemporary metaphysics takes itself to be an enquiry into the fundamental nature and structure of reality, a flawed methodology has been used in pursuit of this aim. philosophers have been examining language in order to try to uncover ontological truths about reality. as a result, their arguments move from facts about language to facts about reality. the debate concerning the ontological status of tense1 in the philosophy of time brings this flawed methodology to light. in order to argue for their respective ontological positions, the a-theorist and the b-theorist2 place an unusual amount of emphasis on our temporal language. in this paper, i will call this methodology into question. i will argue that it is fallacious to argue from claims about language to conclusions about reality; it is committing a fallacy called the representational fallacy.3 i will use the argument from tense in the philosophy of 1 tense in language is when a speaker talks about or refers to a moment in time, relative to the moment in time from which he or she is speaking. most languages include phrases that suggest past, present and future with respect to the moment of time from which the utterer is speaking. i.e. if i say “it is raining now,” this is a (present) tensed phrase because “is” and “now” indicate the moment of time that i am uttering it (which is the present, it is raining now). thus, these phrases depend on context. this will be addressed further in sections 4 and 5. 2 a-theory and b-theory are two different ways of thinking about time and how it works. 3 a term coined by heather dyke (2007). in metaphysics and the representational fallacy, 1. london: routledge. 44 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college time to betray this fallacy, and to argue that both a-theorists, who think that tensed language demonstrates the existence of tensed facts, and b-theorists, who think that they can demonstrate the existence of tenseless facts by translating tensed sentences, commit the representational fallacy. in each of their respective arguments, they move from facts about language to facts about reality. next, i will argue that both a-theorists and b-theorists end up committing this fallacy due to a flawed assumption about the relationship between language and reality. i will argue that this assumption is false, and i will write about how the possibility of moving past the debate from language depends on rejecting this flawed assumption. lastly, i will present two new responses the b-theorist can give to the original a-theory argument from tense, thus proposing a new way of doing metaphysics.4 ii. what is the representational fallacy? before i demonstrate the representational fallacy in the ontology of time, i will first introduce it and talk about why it is fallacious to move from premises about language to conclusions about reality. “the term ‘representational fallacy’ refers to a general philosophical tendency to place too much emphasis on the significance of language when doing ontology” (dyke 2007:14). this fallacy does not refer to one invalid argument, or form of argument; instead, it indicates a fallacious strategy of reading metaphysics off of language (dyke 2007:7). reading metaphysics off of language makes language, rather than reality, the starting point in our investigations. what does it mean to read metaphysics off of language? take the sentence “asking two girls to the prom left bill in a quandary.” let us suppose it is a true sentence. if a philosopher argues that reality includes the existence of entities called quandaries, based on the fact that a quandary occurs in this true sentence, then the philosopher is reading ontological facts off of language. in this case, he is reading a true sentence and deciding that, based on the fact that this sentence is true, there must exist entities called quandaries. but this is absurd. there is nothing about this sentence that tells us the sentence is made true because there are entities called quandaries that exist (or that we must posit entities such as quandaries). the truth of this sentence does not entail the existence of entities called quandaries. thus, the philosopher who makes this move is reasoning fallaciously. in this case, the philosopher is committing the representational fallacy. dyke believes that philosophers who commit this fallacy are either implicitly or explicitly assuming that there is only one way in which our world can be based on our true sentences about it, and that examining these sentences will reveal the nature of reality to us. (dyke 2007: 63) however, this is a mistake. a single language is compatible with many opposing ontologies, so it cannot be the case that a close 4 this paper and its arguments are largely inspired by heather dyke. 45issue v f spring 2018 the representational fallacy and the ontology of time examination of that language would reveal to us the true nature of reality. let us consider, for example, a simple language that consists of just proper names and predicates, and suppose that some of the sentences in this language are true. one interpretation of such a language might be immanent realism, where proper names refer only to particulars and predicates refer only to the universals of immanent realism.5 another interpretation of such a language might be platonism, where proper names refer only to objects in the world of appearances and predicates refer only to the forms.6 additionally, trope theory, resemblance, nominalism, class nominalism, and any other variant of nominalism all can be plausible modes of interpreting such a language. (dyke 2007: 64) moreover, nothing about this language decides which of these interpretations is the right interpretation. all we can say, if backed with metaphysical and/or scientific arguments, is that one of these interpretations is right, and that we can use our simple language to help describe our true ontology. to illustrate this point further, i will consider an example adapted from john heil. if we take a billiard ball, there are many true ways of describing it. you may say that “the billiard ball is spherical,” or that “the billiard ball is red.” many predicates hold true of it. but “to imagine that to every significant predicate there corresponds a property, [for instance,] is to let language call the shots ontologically.”7 for instance, to imagine that there must exist a property that corresponds to the significant predicate “is spherical,” because it occurs in a true sentence, is to let language dictate ontology. it could be the case that there is a property corresponding to the predicate “is spherical,” but language cannot tell us this. language cannot tell us what makes the statement the billiard ball is spherical” true. and inferring that there must be a property “is spherical” or “is red” simply because we know that these properties are true of the billiard ball (that it is spherical and red) is committing the representational fallacy. the truth of the sentence does not entail the existence of these properties—this is reading ontology off of language. instead, what makes these truths true could be because they “participate in the form of redness, belongs to a resemblance class of red things, has a red trope.” but “knowing that [the sentence] is true, even knowing what its truth-condition is, does not tell us what it is about the world that makes it true.” (dyke 2007: 65) for this reason, dyke suggests that instead of looking at sentences we take to be true and deducing metaphysical conclusions from them, we should to the world to explain how our true sentences become true. i have just introduced the representational fallacy, explained how it is committed, and suggested a new form of metaphysical enquiry. i will now address immediate, and potential objections to this new methodology. 5 dyke suggests “universals are tied to particulars by the relation of inheritance, whereby a universal inheres in a particular” in this case. (dyke 2007: 64) 6 dyke suggests “the relation that ties objects to the forms is that of participation” for this example. (dyke 2007: 64) 7 john heil. philosophy of mind: a contemporary introduction, 204. new york: routledge. 2013. 46 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college iii. objections to the new methodology a philosopher might object to the new methodology by claiming that we cannot say that our true sentences, such as “the billiard ball is spherical,” tell us something about reality if we claim that facts about language can tell us nothing about reality. after all, “the billiard ball is spherical” is a linguistic claim (insofar as it is a linguistic entity; a sentence), and it is one we take to be true. the philosopher might add, “your recommendation is that we attend to reality itself, rather than to language, when doing metaphysics. but how do we do this? we come up with theories that we express in sets of sentences that we take to be true.” based on this, the philosopher might conclude, with respect to these sentences, that we are either being inconsistent (and must deny these sentences can tell us anything about reality), or that we are committing the representational fallacy ourselves when attending to these sentences.8 this objection misunderstands the nature of the representational fallacy. simply using language to say what the world is like is not committing the fallacy. we must, of course, use language to articulate our theories. that is not a problem. the problem appears when we use language to defend our ontological claims (i.e., when we claim that there must exist a property corresponding to “is spherical” because it is a significant predicate and because “the billiard ball is spherical” is a true sentence). as long as the reasons we use to support our claims are metaphysical and/or scientific, for instance, and do not have to do with language, the fallacy has not been committed. thus, i do not commit the fallacy by merely stating that “the billiard ball is spherical” is true, as i am not using the truth of the sentence to argue for the existence of a property that corresponds with its significant predicate. “the representational fallacy occurs when claims about descriptions of reality are taken to generate a metaphysics, not when claims about reality itself (which, of course, are couched in language) are taken to do so.” (dyke 2007: 5) the philosopher may concede that it is fallacious to draw ontological conclusions from descriptions about reality9, but he may insist that it cannot be fallacious to draw ontological facts from true descriptions of reality. the philosopher might add that the fact that ontological conclusions do follow from true descriptions is a consequence of the truth schema. for example, “the billiard ball is spherical” is true if and only if the billiard ball is spherical.10 this objection cannot mean that the truth schema itself entails the billiard ball is 8 this objection and its response can be found in dyke (2007). in metaphysics and the representational fallacy, 4. 9 descriptions about reality are descriptions created using language, sentences or linguistic entities to illustrate reality (they may try to show or capture how reality is). 10 this objection and its response can be found in dyke (2007). in metaphysics and the representational fallacy, 5. 47issue v f spring 2018 the representational fallacy and the ontology of time spherical. otherwise, “phoenixes exist” is true if and only if phoenixes exist would entail the existence of phoenixes. the objection must instead mean that (1) the truth schema, (2) together with the claim that the sentence in question is true, (3) entails the ontological conclusion in question.11 but then, what ontological conclusions are we to derive from the following instances of the truth schema, together with the claim that the sentence on the left-hand side is true? ‘eating people is wrong’ is true if and only if eating people is wrong; ‘there are prime numbers greater than a million’ is true if and only if there are prime numbers greater than a million, and even ‘the teacher’s resignation left the students in a lurch’ is true if and only if the teacher's resignation left the students in a lurch. are we to take the truth of these sentences, together with these instances of the truth schema, to entail to existence of, respectively, moral properties, numbers and lurches? surely not (musgrave 1993: 266-7).12 additionally, it is plausible that someone admit to the truth of these sentences without also admitting to the existence of moral properties, numbers and lurches, so it cannot be the case that semantics alone gives us metaphysics. again, knowing that a sentence is true does not tell you what makes the sentence true; what makes a sentence true we may call its truth-maker. 13 when i talk about the argument from tense in philosophy of time, i will argue that it is possible for two or more non-synonymous sentences to be made true by the same truth-maker. sentences such as “it is raining now” and “it is raining at 5:44pm,” supposing now is 5:44pm, are both made true in virtue of the same truth-maker, even though they are non-synonymous.14 and if it is possible for two or more nonsynonymous sentences to have the same truth-maker (i.e., the same thing that makes them true), then it does not suffice to focus on a true sentence in order to find what makes it true. in order to find the thing that makes both non-synonymous sentences true, we must appeal to metaphysical and/or scientific considerations, not linguistic ones. the truth-maker that makes both “it is raining now” and “it is raining at 5:44pm” true is a fact about the world, not a fact about either of the two sentences. one implication of admitting that it is possible for two or more non-synonymous 11 e.g. (1) “phoenixes exist” is true if and only if phoenixes exist, (2) together with the sentence “phoenixes exist” being true, (3) entails the ontological existence of phoenixes. (this example is not meant to suggest phoenixes exist, it is only meant to clarify the objection.) 12 dyke (2007). in metaphysics and the representational fallacy, 5. 13 truth-makers are supposed to be the facts in the world that make certain sentences true. truth-maker and fact are used interchangeably in this paper. i will not be providing an account of truth-makers in this paper, as it is a separate dispute. mentioning truth-makers is meant to suggest an alternative approach to certain metaphysical questions that have been using the fallacious strategy of reading metaphysics off of language as arguments or in response to arguments. (dyke 2007: 81) 14 and i as explained in an introductory footnote above, “it is raining now” is a sentence with tense, or a tensed sentence, since it refers to the moment of time that it is uttered (the present). “it is raining at 5:44pm” is not a tensed sentence, since it does not take the moment of time that it is uttered (the present) into consideration. when i talk about different ways of thinking about time in section 5, i will argue that these two sentences are non-synonymous sentences. 48 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college sentences to have the same truth-maker is that it is not the case that there is exactly one, but, rather, many ways to truly describe the world.15 hence, “it is raining now” and “it is raining at 5:44pm” are both true ways to describe the world. i will now talk about the argument from tense in the ontology of time and show how the representational fallacy has been committed in this metaphysical dispute. iv. a-theory versus b-theory for the remainder of my paper, i would like to draw upon a case-study that shows the representational fallacy in practice. it is the argument from tense in the a-theory versus b-theory debate in the ontology of time. first, i will define the a-series and b-series, and give key terms associated with them. then, i will write about the argument from tense. john mctaggart distinguished two ways of thinking about time.16 one way is the a-series, which is the series that takes our common-sense distinction between past, present and future to be true, and says that there is a real ontological distinction between them. the other way is the b-series, which is the series that accepts that all time is real, and posits that there is no ontological distinction between the past, present and future. b-theorists believe the fact that we draw a distinction between past, present and future in ordinary life is reflective of our perspective on temporal reality.17 time is seen as dynamic for the a-series, since what was future is now present, what was present is now past, and not for the b-series, since time does not flow in the way just described. along with their respective ontological views of time, key terms are associated with each of them. the a-series is typically associated with the terms pastness, presentness, and futureness. phrases such as, “today”, “yesterday”, “five weeks ago” and “three hundred years from now” are part of the a-series conception of time and are called tensed phrases. the b-series is associated with the terms simultaneous with, earlier than and later than. that is, event 1 is simultaneous with event 2 in time, for instance, or event 1 is earlier than event 2. phrases such as, “two months after september 11th, 2001” or “on april 5th, 1688” are consistent with the b-theory of time, and are called tenseless phrases.18 in the debate from tense, the a-theorist takes phrases with tense such as “tomorrow i will get my hair cut” or “today was a good day” to represent facts about reality. the a-theorist believes that the fact that we say things like today and tomorrow, which correspond with our true sentences, means that there must exist some ontological 15 this claim does not need to commit a philosopher to antirealism, dyke (2007). in metaphysics and the representational fallacy, 89-90. for the purposes of my paper, it is not important that i show why. 16 mctaggart. the nature of existence, vol. ii. cambridge: cambridge university press. 1927. 17 b-theorists are also generally eternalists, or accept the block view of time. imagine time as a big block, and if you move along the block you will see different moments of time. in this way, time is viewed similarly to space. 18 distinction between a-series and b-series is also found in dyke (2007). in metaphysics and the representational fallacy, 37-8. 49issue v f spring 2018 the representational fallacy and the ontology of time properties such as today and tomorrow. hence, the philosopher who accepts a-theory would argue that since the b-series cannot account for these phrases in their ontology of time, it must be false. the old b-theorist response to this argument would be to say that it is incorrect, because they could provide the a-theorist with synonymous paraphrases that capture those a-series phrases. without moving any further, it is obvious this “debate takes as its starting point our ordinary temporal language and asks what this tells us about the nature of time itself.” (dyke 2007: 9) the debate moves from facts about language to facts about reality. in the next part of my essay, i will argue that both a-theorists, who believe tensed language demonstrates the existence of tensed facts, and b-theorists, who think they can demonstrate the existence of tenseless facts by translating tensed sentences, commit the representational fallacy. they both assume that we can read ontological conclusions off of our temporal language. v. the representational fallacy in the ontology of time much of early a-theory work argued that tense could not be eliminated from natural language without loss of meaning. from this, the a-theorists concluded that temporal reality itself must be tensed. this argument moves from premises about temporal language to conclusions about reality. they argued that tense was not eliminable because no tenseless sentence conveys as much information as a tensed sentence. in his “tensed statements,” richard gale gives an example to highlight this. suppose joe’s job is to inform his military company when the enemy are within 100 yards of their post. if joe yells (the tensed sentence) “the enemy are now within 100 yards,” his company will be warned of the enemy’s position and can take appropriate action. if joe, instead, yells (the tenseless sentence) “the enemy are within 100 yards at 2:15pm,” his company will not be warned unless they know that now is 2:15pm.19 for this reason, a-theorists have concluded that “since tensed expressions convey more information than tenseless sentences, there must exist something in reality that corresponds to this additional information conveyed.” (dyke 2007: 40) there must exist properties in reality that correspond to the tense in our sentences, they say. this example successfully shows that we cannot translate tensed sentences into tenseless sentences without loss of meaning. however, the example does not warrant drawing the conclusion that reality must thereby be tensed, as that commits the representational fallacy. after all, someone could accept that tensed sentences cannot be translated without loss of meaning, while also believing that reality is actually tenseless. william lane craig (2000) is an a-theorist who has recently made this fallacious move. his argument is as follows: p1: tensed sentences ostensibly ascribe ontological tenses. 19 gale: 1962; dyke 2007: 40 50 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college p2: unless tensed sentences are shown to be reducible without loss of meaning to tenseless sentences or ontological tense is shown to be superfluous to human thought and action, the ostensible ascription of ontological tenses by tensed sentences ought to be accepted as veridical. p3: tensed sentences have not been shown to be reducible without loss of meaning to tenseless sentences. p4: ontological tense has not been shown to be superfluous to human thought and action. c: therefore, the ostensible ascription of ontological tenses by tensed sentences ought to be accepted as veridical. (craig 2000: 22; numbering of premises changed)20 he moves from the claim that tensed sentences are not reducible, without loss of meaning, to tenseless sentences to the conclusion that we ought to accept that the tense given by our tensed sentences is true of reality. craig believes that in order to refute his argument, the b-theorist must either refute p3 and show that tensed sentences can be translated into tenseless sentences, or refute p4, and show that tensed facts are not required for human thought or action. this, nonetheless, is a false dilemma. the b-theorist could maintain both p3 and p4 and, instead, reject p2. he thinks p2 “has offered the b-theorist her only escape route from the conclusion of his argument.” (dyke 2007: 43) yet, this is not true. the b-theorist could agree with both p3 and p4—that tense cannot be eliminated and is needed for human thought and action—and believe that these true tensed sentences are made true by tenseless facts. i have just shown how the a-theorist moves from premises about temporal language to facts about reality in the debate from tense and suggested an alternative response for the b-theorist. i will now discuss an old b-theorist response to this debate. b-theorists believe that there are no tensed facts and no tensed properties—the fact that we say things like today and tomorrow, for instance, is reflective of how we perceive time, not of time itself. the old b-theorists tried to prove this by rejecting p3, or by showing that tensed expressions can be eliminated from natural language. (russell 1915; goodman 1951: 287-301; quine 1960: 36; smart 1963: 132-42).21 b-theorists tried to appeal to parsimony or ockham’s razor to support their claim that tenseless sentences displayed the true nature of reality, since tenseless sentences on their own imply the existence of fewer entities than tensed sentences (and are thus preferred) (dyke 2007: 43). b-theorists concluded from this that tensed sentences are eliminable, since there is no feature of reality they actually describe, and tried to translate tensed sentences into tenseless sentences. these b-theorists believed 20 (dyke 2007: 42) 21 (dyke 2007: 43) 51issue v f spring 2018 the representational fallacy and the ontology of time that their translation project was successful, having demonstrated the existence of only tenseless facts, and that there was no ontological distinction between past, present and future. their translation project was unsuccessful, however. as we saw in gale’s example above, it is not possible to translate tensed sentences into tenseless sentences without some loss in meaning (see joe’s informing the military company example). tense in language is a context-dependent phenomenon, since whether or not a sentence is true depends on the time it was uttered.22 not only was his translation project unsuccessful, but the b-theorist who argues that translating tensed sentences into tenseless sentences shows there are only tenseless facts, commits the representational fallacy. their argument is no different from the a-theorist’s, as both move from facts about language to facts about reality. why do both the a-theorist and b-theorist make this move? dyke suggests that there must be a hidden assumption that they both accept, which is informing the move from making purely linguistic claims to concluding ontological ones. it is my, and heather dyke’s, view that these philosophers are assenting to the assumption that there must be “a privileged, true description of reality, which can inform us about the ontological nature of reality.” (dyke 2007: 44) this makes up part of a thesis called the strong linguistic thesis (slt). in the next section of my paper, i will show why the a-theorist and the b-theorist must assume slt for their debate to make sense, and then, i will subsequently refute slt. vi. strong linguistic thesis (slt) the strong linguistic thesis (slt) says that “there is one privileged, true description of reality, the sentences of which (a) stand in a one-to-one correspondence with facts in the world, and (b) are structurally isomorphic to the facts with which they correspond.” (dyke 2007: 46) there are a couple of ways of understanding “one true description of reality.” i believe the a-theorists and b-theorists are understanding it to mean that “there is one true description of reality which contains a subset of all the truths that there are. this subset of truths is ontologically perspicuous, in that each truth in it reveals the nature of the fact that it describes, and that makes it true.” (dyke 2007: 45-46) in other words, they must accept (1) with each true proposition there corresponds a single truth, and (2) each true proposition tells of the nature of its truth. for this reason, there can only be one fact per linguistic utterance, one truth-maker per sentence. if there were more than one, a choice would have to be made between them. slt thus involves a commitment to the claim that there is a one-to-one correspondence between truths in the one true description of reality and truths in the facts about the world. (dyke 2007: 46) 22 “this conclusion was originally arrived at by philosophers working in the philosophy of language, on the linguistic phenomena of indexicals and demonstratives. these philosophers established that no sentence containing a context-dependent expression, like an indexical or a demonstrative, could be translated by any sentence that was wholly context dependent (castañeda 1967; perry 1979).” (dyke 2007, 44) 52 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college i will now argue that philosophers must either knowingly or unknowingly accept slt in order for certain metaphysical debates, like the debate from tense in the ontology of time, to make sense. in order for a-theorists to reach the conclusion that reality must be tensed because language is tensed, they must think (1) there is a fact corresponding to every truth in that description, and, (2) that the truths are structurally isomorphic to facts. (dyke 2007: 46) without (1) a-theorists could not infer there are any facts in reality that correspond to their true tensed phrases, and without (2) a-theorists could not infer that these corresponding facts must be tensed.23 the same applies for old b-theorists of time. without (1) b-theorists could not infer there are any facts in reality that correspond to their true tenseless phrases, and without (2) b-theorists could not infer that those corresponding facts must be tenseless.24 now, it may be that if presented with slt, most philosophers would reject it. regardless of whether or not philosophers think it is false on its own merits, it needs to be assumed in order for certain arguments, such as the argument from tense, to make sense. “once we make it explicit, and then reject it we can see that those disputes are by and large, fruitless.” (dyke 2007: 47) i will now argue against slt. the component of slt that i am arguing against is that there is one privileged, true description of reality, “where that description is taken to be a subset of all the truths that there are, and where the sense in which it is ‘privileged’ is that it contains ineliminable kinds of term.” (dyke 2007: 72) slt is false because the fact that true sentences contain property terms does not entail the existence of these properties. (dyke 2007: 72) as i argued in section 2, nothing about our language tells us what makes our sentences true, and the truth of certain sentences does not entail the existence of certain properties. since i am denying that there is one privileged, true description of reality, in this sense, i am also denying that there is a one-to-one correspondence between truths and facts. the ratio of truths to facts is many-to-one, as i showed in section 3. there are many ways to truly state a fact, since two or more non-synonymous sentences can be made true by the same truth-maker. both “it is raining now” and “it is raining at 5:44pm” are made true by the same truth-maker, the same fact in the world, and, thus, they are both accurate ways of describing that fact. the fact that there is a many-to-one ratio allows for there to be better or worse descriptions of any fact. for instance, “it is raining at 5:44pm” would be a better way to most accurately describe its truth-maker if you are a b-theorist, and “it is raining now” would be a worse way. but what it does not allow is the inference that since a sentence cannot be paraphrased, there must exist a fact that can only be described by that truth. thus, i reject that there need be any isomorphism between truths 23 “without (1), the a-theorist would not be able to infer that there are any ontological counterparts to her tensed truths. without (2) she would not be able to infer that those ontological counterparts are tensed.” (dyke 2007: 46) 24 “without (1), she would not be able to infer that there are any ontological counterparts to her tenseless truths. without (2) she would not be able to infer that those ontological counterparts are tenseless.” (dyke 2007: 46) 53issue v f spring 2018 the representational fallacy and the ontology of time and the facts that they describe. there may be isomorphism between truths and the facts that they describe, but we cannot rely on this possibility in all cases. hence, we cannot draw conclusions about the ontological nature and structure of our reality from claims about the nature and structure of reality of our true sentences. (dyke 2007: 72-3) i have just shown how the a-theorist and old b-theorist must accept slt in order for the argument from tense to make sense, delineated slt, and argued against it. i will now give a couple of new b-theorist responses to the argument from tense— one is the truth-condition variant of the new b-theory, and the other is the truthmaker variant of the new b-theory. then, i will argue against the truth-condition variant, since it also places too much emphasis on language, and support the truthmaker variant of the b-theory of time on the grounds that it is in line with our new metaphysical enquiry. vii. truth-condition vs. truth-maker variant new b-theorist responses emerged because of the failure of the old translation project. these b-theorists realized that they needed new ways to respond to the a-theorist’s argument from tense. the first way in which the new b-theorist responded was by the truth-condition variant of the b-theory. the second was by the truth-maker variant of the b-theory. i will first show how the truth-condition variant is also prone to committing the representational fallacy, and then i will advocate for the truth-maker variant of the b-theory of time as an alternative approach. proponents of the new b-theory of time agree that tense cannot be eliminated from language, but disagree whether this means that reality is itself tensed. “proponents of the truth-condition variant argue that, while it is not possible to translate any tensed sentence into a tenseless sentence, it is possible to state the truth-condition of any tensed sentence in entirely tenseless terms.” (dyke 2007: 47-48) in other words, they believe that it is possible to state the conditions in which the world must be for the sentence to be true. for instance, if we take the utterance “the enemy is now approaching,” then the truth-condition b-theorist would say “the enemy is now approaching” is true, if and only if the enemy’s approach is tenselessly simultaneous with the sentence “the enemy is now approaching.” that is to say, the condition in the world it takes for “the enemy is now approaching” to be true, is that the enemy approaches at 2:15pm, when “now” is uttered it is 2:15pm. there are a couple of ways to construct this approach. one is to say that they argue that since tensed sentences can be given tenseless truth-conditionals, reality is tenseless. another way is to say that the new b-theorist has separate arguments for the b-theory account of time, and that he offers the tenseless conditional alternative, not as an argument for b-theory, but as a way to show how the semantics of tensed sentences are compatible 54 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college with b-theory. (dyke 2007: 48) the latter approach is fine; the former is fallacious. some philosophers believe that if we know the conditions it takes for a sentence to be true, then we know what the world must be like in order to make that sentence true: “so, if a sentence is true, we know what the world, as described by that sentence, is like.” (dyke 2007: 73) however, it is a mistake to think that knowing the conditions it takes for a sentence to be true can generate ontology, since that is just another way of trying to read ontological facts off of language. arguing from the claim that tensed sentences can be given tenseless truth-conditionals, to the claim that reality is tenseless, commits the representational fallacy. “this suggests that we are able to determine whether a sentence is true or false just by examining its truth-condition, but this is not true. examining its truth-condition will tell us what must be the case for the sentence to be true.” (dyke 2007: 50) stating the truth-condition of a sentence is specifying what the world must be like in order for that sentence to be true—it does not tell us whether the truth-condition is actually upheld by reality. in order to know this, we must appeal to metaphysical and/or scientific considerations. if truthcondition b-theorists argue from the claim that we give our tensed sentences tenseless truth-conditionals, to the conclusion that reality is thereby tenseless, then they seem to use the same fallacious strategy that the a-theorist and the old b-theorist of time used. this strategy accepts slt, which i argued is false in section 6. i have just argued against using tenseless truth-conditionals as an argument for the b-theory of time. i will now introduce the truth-maker variant of the b-theory of time. the significance of the truth-condition project was to state what the world must be like in order to make our sentences true. however, “by focusing on this notion of how the world makes a true sentence true instead of on how to state the truthcondition of a tensed sentence, one arrives at the truth-maker variant of the new b-theory.” (dyke 2007: 54) what distinguishes the truth-condition variant from the truth-maker variant of the b-theory is that the truth-maker variant is a purely ontological thesis. the truth-maker variant of the b-theory makes the world, instead of language, our starting point. it takes ontological facts about time, and uses them to explain the semantics of our temporal language. the truth-maker variant of the b-theory also holds that tense cannot be eliminated from language, but denies this means temporal reality is tensed. thus, it rejects slt—that sentences of that description stand in a one-to-one correspondence with the facts in the world, or that those sentences need be structurally isomorphic to the facts that make them true. (dyke 2007: 55) though they believe that tensed sentences cannot be eliminated or reduced to tenseless sentences, this belief does not entail that there exist some extralinguistic25 tensed fact that corresponds to the tensed sentence. what makes these tensed sentences true are truth-makers—scientific and/or metaphysical reasons, and not linguistic ones. 25 extra-linguistic simply means beyond linguistics, or something that is not language. 55issue v f spring 2018 the representational fallacy and the ontology of time what should be taken away from all of this? philosophers should stop looking at our language in order to discover facts about reality. as i have shown in my paper, our language cannot reveal ontological facts to us, for there is nothing about a sentence that tells us what makes it true (see section 2). there are also additional reasons to believe that sentences do not reveal their truth-makers to us. competent language speakers may understand the sentence “the ball is red,” and see that it is a true sentence under the right conditions, without understanding what makes this sentence true. what makes the sentence true could be that the ball exemplifies universal redness, or has a red trope. but nothing about this sentence could tell a competent languagespeaker that.26 in order to know this fact—how the sentence comes to be true—we need to attend to metaphysical and/or scientific considerations. for this reason, we should attend to reality itself while doing metaphysics, the parts of reality that are the truthmakers of our sentences, and, from there, see how our sentences get to be true. viii. conclusion in this paper, i criticized a fallacious methodology by introducing the representational fallacy. i explained that this fallacy is committed when philosophers place too much emphasis on language while doing metaphysics. i gave immediate objections to the new methodology, and then displayed, and betrayed, the fallacy in the argument from tense in the philosophy of time. i argued that philosophers must either implicitly or explicitly accept the strong linguistic thesis (slt) in order to warrant the move from language to reality and for certain metaphysical disputes to make sense. my paper argued that a-theorists and b-theorists assent to slt in their argument from tense, and then proceeded to refute slt. i concluded by providing some new b-theorist responses to the argument and suggested a new way of doing metaphysics. “a fallacy is just an invalid argument and recognizing that an argument is invalid does not permit the inference that its conclusion is false.” (dyke 2007: 60) this paper is not meant to disprove the a-theory of time and does not entitle us to conclude the a-theory of time is false. it is meant to show that it is erroneous to argue from language to reality. hence, a-theorists are not entitled to use this argument when arguing for their position. if the a-theory is correct, then they must use other arguments to justify their ontological stance on time. this paper also did not argue that the b-theory changed their stance on time. both the old and new b-theorists maintain the same metaphysical views, this has not changed. what has changed is their methodology. the old b-theorists thought when presented with the argument from tense their job was to offer translations to show how facts about the world were actually tenseless. but as i have argued for in my paper, this move commits the representational fallacy. the new b-theorists agreed with the a-theorists that tense was not eliminable from natural language; however, they rejected the translation project and maintained reality was still tenseless. two responses emerged from this, the truth-condition and 26 example inspired by dyke (2007). in metaphysics and the representational fallacy, 73-4. 56 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college truth-maker variant of the b-theory of time. ultimately, the truth-condition variant, if used as an argument for the b-theory of time, also committed the representational fallacy. for this reason, i advocated for the truth-maker variant of the b-theory of time in order to avoid reasoning fallaciously. the truth-maker variant of the b-theory relies on metaphysical and/or scientific considerations in order to reach metaphysical conclusions. it starts from reality and uses it to explain language. at the end of the day, i believe, we should reject the view that there is a certain privileged language or description of reality that we can read off of, which will tell us the way the world is. f bibliography dyke, heather. metaphysics and the representational fallacy. london: routledge, 2007. heil, john. philosophy of mind: a contemporary introduction. new york: routledge, 2013. musgrave, alan. common sense, science and scepticism: a historical introduction to the theory of knowledge. cambridge: cambridge university press. 1993. mctaggart, john m.e. the nature of existence, vol. ii. cambridge: cambridge university press, 1927. gale, richard m. “tensed statements,” philosophical quarterly. 1962. craig, william l. the tensed theory of time: a critical examination. dordrecht: kluwer academic publishers, 2000. castañeda, h.-n. “indicators and quasi-indicators,” american philosophical quarterly. 1967. perry, john. “the problem of the essential indexical,” noûs. 1979. russell, bertrand. “on the experience of time.” the monist. 1915. goodman, nelson. the structure of appearance. cambridge, mass.: harvard university press. 1951. quine, willard v.o. word and object. cambridge, mass.: mit press. 1960. smart, john j.c. philosophy and scientific realism. london: routledge & kegan paul. 1963. 17issue v f spring 2018 δι αν οι α 17 it was nothing a conversation with heidegger and the kyoto school on nothingness matthew a. stanley in his exploration of anxiety, heidegger remarks that once our anxiety has subsided we are inclined to say, “it was really nothing.” “this way of talking,” he observes, “indeed, gets at what it was ontically.”1 heidegger takes the state of anxiety to reveal the nature of nothingness to us, and in this insight lies a complex story. the mundane appearance of nothingness often serves to conceal our failure to be clear on the true nature of nothingness. though we think we understand nothingness plainly, we often find ourselves tied up in knots when we are questioned about it. these questions are only further complicated by the differing notions of nothingness that have developed in the philosophical conversations in the east and west. however, recent developments in the philosophical conversation in europe have opened up new avenues for engagement between the two traditions. beginning in the early 20th century, a handful of japanese philosophers, who later came to be called the kyoto school, sought to engage with the philosophical conversation that was taking place in germany and france. in particular, the thinkers of the kyoto school found martin heidegger to be a fruitful conversation partner, even going so far as to study under his tutelage in germany.2 though these japanese thinkers 1 martin heidegger, being and time, trans. joan stambaugh (albany, ny: state university of new york press, 2010), 165. (all pages are marginal pages from the 2nd edition of stambaugh’s translation.) 2 as with any movement, speaking about the school as a ‘movement’ overlooks crucial nuances. however, one may broadly say the school is composed of nishida kitaro (1870-1945), his student tanabe hajime (18851962), 18 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college were well trained in the texts of the western conversation, their fundamental commitments remained with the zen buddhist tradition, which allowed them to arrive at a unique viewpoint on the west’s philosophical questions and to facilitate new ways forward in the midst of those struggles. in this paper, i will seek to explore nishitani keiji’s critique of western nihilism—a critique that nishitani extends to heidegger’s thought. i will attempt a conversion project in order to allow for smooth and productive dialogue between these two parties. due to deep differences between their respective traditions, however, nishitani and heidegger appear to eventually reach an impasse. i will attempt to identify the source of this impasse, and to sketch potential ways to move forward. in short, though this paper can only serve as a catalyst for further conversations, i hope that it will nonetheless clarify the terms of the conversation so as to bear fruit at a later date. though anxiety provides us with an opportunity to engage in the conversation between the east and the west, the goal of this paper is not, ultimately, to comprehend anxiety. this paper's true aim is to understand the questions and concepts that gave shape to heidegger and nishitani’s thought. with that in mind, let us start with §39 of being and time, where heidegger proposes to determine the mode of attunement that presents dasein to itself in the most naked manner possible.3 for heidegger, a mode of attunement (or ‘mood’) reveals our orientation towards our thrownness4, which is our already having found ourselves having a world.5 we experience our particular situatedness in our world as thrown because we find ourselves already being there, rather than having chosen to be there. essentially, we discover that we have already arrived at the place of having a finite set of possibilities. attunement reveals dasein’s structures of being-in-the-world through an examination of how dasein orients itself to its thrownness. heidegger proposes anxiety as that mode of attunement that can bring dasein to presentation in the wholeness that it possesses primordially.6 in an intriguing turn, heidegger surmises that those attunements, which involve a flight from dasein, actually disclose dasein with the least amount of pretense.7 why would this be the case? heidegger takes it that if dasein flees from itself, then it flees precisely from itself, which is there disclosed. in fleeing from itself, dasein recognizes itself as itself. in this case, anxiety serves as an orientation of dasein that turns away from its thrownness with trembling, but does so precisely because it sees itself as thrown. and his other student nishitani keiji (1900-1990). there are others who trace themselves to this school, such as abe masao (who’s philosophy i will be employing in this paper). the kyoto school tradition still remains a crucial part of the identity of the philosophy department at kyoto university to this day. for an excellent introductory text to the kyoto school, see james w. heisig, philosophers of nothingness: an essay on the kyoto school. (honolulu: university of hawaii press, 2001). 3 heidegger, 181-182 4 ibid., 139. 5 ibid., 135. 6 ibid., 187. 7 ibid., 184-186. 19issue v f spring 2018 it was nothing the illuminating nuance of heidegger’s concept of anxiety becomes clearer when anxiety is contrasted with fear. when an individual experiences fear, heidegger says, that individual becomes oriented toward innerworldly beings.8 for instance, i can be afraid of clowns or the dark. these phenomena are definite beings within our world, and are thus objects to dasein. however, anxiety differs from fear in that anxiety does not have an object as such. anxiety is anxious about nothing, for anxiety is dasein’s being anxious about being-in-the-world itself.9 anxiety confronts dasein with the sheer possibility of possibilities that make up dasein’s world and thus make up dasein itself, because dasein is essentially that being that understands itself in terms of its own possibilities for being.10 because anxiety lacks an ontic referent, it transcends the realm of objective presence and alerts dasein to its own fraught relationship with the world, which it has actively tried to anaesthetize by absorbing innerworldy beings into the forgetfulness of the horizon that determines those beings in their being. thus, when anxiety unmasks absorption in innerworldly beings as being essentially determined by nothing, dasein finds itself unmoored at sea, in a world of pure possibility-for-being-in-the-world, which is to say, nothingness. all innerworldy beings have fallen away and have been revealed as ultimately meaningless by virtue of their lack of foundation. dasein is awakened to the ipseity of its ownmost possibility for being-in-the-world. dasein comes to realize that only it can choose the possibilities before it. yet, dasein also realizes that all those possibilities have been problematized by their essential lack of grounding. these possibilities hang over the abyss of nothing, and thus dasein finds itself hanging over this same abyss. naturally, dasein finds itself terrified and seeks to flee from itself and back into the realm of innerworldly beings. this is precisely because dasein has realized the depth of the nothingness that lies at the ground of the whole world, and even of itself. heidegger’s account of anxiety allows us to bring the kyoto school into the conversation, for the question of anxiety lies at the the heart of buddhism. nishitani says, “we become aware of religion as a need, as a must for life, only at the level of life at which everything loses its necessity and its utility…when we come to doubt the meaning of our existence in this way, when we have become a question to ourselves, the religious quest awakens within us.”11 buddhism seeks to confront this problem of anxiety through an analysis of self-consciousness. when we find ourselves anxious, often we say that we are being ‘self-conscious’; that is, we are hyper aware of our own selves as selves. abe masao argues that this problem of being self-conscious is actually peculiar to humans. plants and animals do not suffer from this problem; they simply are themselves. they do not present themselves to themselves so as to compare 8 heidegger, §40. 9 ibid., 186 187 10 ibid., 187-188. 11 nishitani keiji, religion and nothingness, trans. jan van braght (berkeley: university of california press, 1982), 3. 20 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college themselves to others, or as to cast judgments on themselves or others.12 a bird birds. the world worlds. however, humans suffer from this unique phenomenon where we compare ourselves to other people and are thereby conscious of ourselves as selves. zen takes this to mean that we have objectified ourselves (and thereby others).13 i have become an object to myself, and i have made others an object to myself. i may only see myself from the “outside,” so to speak. in this realm of self-consciousness, i find myself on the plane of the subject-object relation. this plane is where selfconsciousness introduces a rupture in the primal unity of all things by relating to them as other, or as “outside” of self-consciousness. the world becomes a field where objects are given to subjects and viewed as objects because the subject takes itself to not be the object. zen seeks precisely to transcend that plane in order to reside on the plane where all things are realized as absolute nothingness. how does one break through this plane of the subject-object in order to realize the nature of all things as absolute nothingness? this process unfolds in three steps, each of which prepares the way for the next. in the first step, one must realize the nothingness that lies at the ground of the subject-object relation, and thus see this subject-object relation for the groundless relation that it is. one must discover its inadequacy before one can move forward. abe proposes an exercise14 in which one asks, “who am i?” he then asks, “who is the one asking, ‘who am i?’” he wants us to realize that there are now two ‘i’s. the i which is inquired after and the i which does the inquiring cannot be the same i, for one is the subject and the other is the object. one is offered to the other as object, yet it is precisely the ‘subject i’ after which one is seeking to inquire after. thus, one is caught in an infinite regression of i’s asking who they are and offering themselves to themselves as objects. he compares this act to a snake attempting to eat its own tail.15 in this way, zen becomes a practice that seeks to undermine and unsettle the individual’s conviction in the self ’s knowledge of itself. however, this unsettling can never become an end in itself, because this unsettling serves the ultimate purpose of preparing one to pass into the next phase. when the self finally reaches the second stage, it becomes completely despairing of ever knowing itself. the self discovers the nothingness that resides beneath its feet. it suddenly must confront its own groundlessness. the self and everything around it become nothingness and meaninglessness. this nihilism nishitani describes as the state of the welling up of “the great doubt,” where the entire self becomes doubt and, in fact, becomes the site where the world doubts itself.16 we can visualize this as a person hanging over an infinite abyss of nothingness. you can’t tell if you’re falling or not, which way is up, down, right, or left, and you have no idea where you are or how you got there. there is truly no place to stand, as nothingness becomes present 12 abe, masao zen and western thought (honolulu: university of hawaii press, 1985), 223. 13 ibid., 225-226. 14 abe., 6. 15 ibid., 226. 16 nishitani, 18-19. 21issue v f spring 2018 it was nothing both within and without. in this stage, one sees nothingness as encroaching upon oneself; nothingness flings one into a state of vertigo. crucial for the account of zen, however, is that one cannot remain in this stage. one must surpass this stage in order to break into the third stage, where all things become absolute nothingness. this is enlightenment. at this point, westerners such as us may be asking, “why does this second stage require surpassing?” zen understands the second stage as problematic because, in this second stage, one still remains trapped within the subject-object relation. when the ego-self (the self in a state of attachment to itself as object) finally hits “rockbottom”, and must confront the abyssal nothingness that resides right at its feet, it has still only managed to make nothingness into an object, and still conceptualizes nothingness as that which opposes itself to being. thus, one has only succeeded in constituting themselves as a self through confronting this nothingness as an object. however, the goal of zen is to break through the plane of the subject-object relation altogether. in the second stage, one no longer objectifies things in general, but, rather, one objectifies nothingness itself. thus, in order to pass to the third stage, emptiness must be emptied of itself. even our representations of nothingness, as a something that is out there while i am in here, must be surpassed. in religion and nothingness, nishitani offers an extended critique of western philosophy, where he presents the philosophies of descartes and sartre as embodying the first and second stage of zen, respectively. in order to better understand why the second stage must too be broken through, we will trace nishitani’s progression from descartes to sartre. nishitani takes it as given that western humans understand themselves primarily as a cartesian ego. in his critique, nishitani reveals the problematic nature of descartes’ cogito ergo sum by following a line of questioning that is similar to the state of aporia that abe’s thought experiment seeks to create in the self. nishitani does not question that the cogito seems to be the most self-evident truth. instead, he calls into question whether or not the cogito is actually the proper standpoint from which to consider the cogito. he takes descartes’ unquestioned and seemingly harmless presupposition to be far from self-evident.17 we can already see the cracks in the foundation of descartes’ presupposition when descartes describes himself as a thinking ‘thing,’ and thus reveals that he has only succeeded in calling himself before himself as an object. nishitani observes that the nature of the cogito itself covers over this problematic. he says, “but because this ego is seen as selfconsciousness mirroring self-consciousness at every turn, and the cogito is seen from the standpoint of the cogito itself, ego becomes a mode of being of the self closed up within itself.”18 this means that the cogito can only secure itself through reference to itself.19 through constantly mirroring itself, the cogito deceives itself into believing 17 nishitani, 14. 18 ibid., 15. 19 ibid., 15. 22 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college that it has a pure and immediate understanding of itself. however, this sounds like nothing more than self-deception. is it not rather the case that this endless cycle of securing the self through reference to the self is actually groundless? much like in abe’s experiment, the cartesian cogito collapses in an infinite regression of mirroring itself. thus, nishitani believes that western nihilism has arrived at the second stage of zen, because the cogito—what descartes describes as a thinking “thing”, and which enshrines the cycle of self-objectification—has had the rug pulled out from under its feet. starting in the 19th century, many western philosophers hit rock bottom and realized the bankruptcy of the attempt to make sense of the world in terms of the subject-object relation. in essence, western philosophy is still figuring out how to live in the wake of the failure of the cartesian ego. thus, nishitani wants to affirm thinkers like sartre and nietzsche for realizing the nothingness that lies at the ground of all things. while nishitani believes that jean-paul sartre and friedrich nietzsche have successfully entered the second stage, he also critiques them for remaining stuck in this phase. nishitani believes that the west is fundamentally lacking the resources to advance to the third stage because the western tradition is too deeply attached to the subject-object relation. however, nishitani also hopes that his work will supply those resources that the west requires to finally break into the third stage. in examining the nature of the second stage, nishitani presents sartre as one who has failed to break into the third stage, and as one who is paradigmatically unable to fully let go of descarte’s cogito. though sartre rightly observes that nothingness resides at the ground of subjectivity, he takes this nothingness to be that which awakens us to our subjectivity and constitutes our freedom as subjects.20 sartre’s atheistic project does not say that god is the ground and guarantor of our subjectivity (to which descartes resorts), but instead asserts that nothingness should assume the function of god.21 if nothing undergirds us, then we are free to endlessly project ourselves out over that nothingness.22 this form of subjectivity, which nishitani says is a type of ekstasis, casts itself forward endlessly and allows the self to affirm itself through its undertakings.23 essence is a groundless illusion; there is only the courageous adventure of choosing whom you will be in the next moment. however, nishitani sees in this the same failures of descartes, only disguised by the language of nothingness. though sartre has realized that the project of consciousness being its own self-ground has become untenable, he has made the more sophisticated mistake of making nothingness into the ground of the self. when nishitani himself says that nothingness is the ground of the self, he does not mean what sartre means. nishitani intends for us to realize that nothingness is the 20 nishitani, 31. 21 ibid. 22 ibid. 23 ibid. 23issue v f spring 2018 it was nothing self and that this nothingness is literally no place. it is not a ground in the sense that sartre uses it. nishitani sees in sartre’s attempt to make nothingness the ground of the self a setting up of a floor that shuts the self up inside of itself. this rock hard nothingness becomes a wall at the bottom of the ego that traps the ego in its own private cave.24 he says, “as long as this nothingness is still set up as something called nothingness-at-the-bottom-of-the-self, it remains what buddhism repudiates as ‘emptiness perversely clung to.’”25 he sums up, “the self that sets up this nothingness is thereby bound by it and attached to it.”26 whereas in descartes, the cartesian cogito was attached to self as self, sartre’s ego has attached itself to an objectified nothingness that it employs like a “springboard” to endlessly extend itself precisely as a self. where, then, do we find ourselves? nishitani has accused western nihilism of being stuck in the second stage of zen. what does nishitani propose as the way forward? what happens when we are emptied even of our representations of emptiness? what sort of an account of things does one give when one has broken through the plane of the subject-object relation to the plane of absolute nothingness? in order to begin to answer these questions, i will again begin with the more practically oriented answers of abe before moving into nishitani’s more philosophical formulations. this will help us to understand the translation project that nishitani is trying to perform. in his essay, “emptiness is suchness,” abe worries that the language of zen has often posed an obstacle to mutual understanding with the west. abe explains that the phrase, “‘everything is emptiness’ may be more adequately rendered: ‘everything is just as it is.’”27 the third phase, which one enters upon breaking the subject-object plane, is precisely where this realization that ‘everything is just as it is’ takes place. why could this realization not take place in the other two phases? in the first phase, one is still attached to the self and thus unable to see things as they are simply in themselves. as subject, one takes things to be for one or given to one as objects, but this means that a thing is only a thing in so far as it is for the self. abe calls this “selfcenteredness,” an obstacle to truly knowing other things. this concept of the various modes of ‘centeredness’ will play a vital role in nishitani’s own account. in the second phase, the objectification of nothingness is the ground of the self, a state that either vindicates or threatens the self. in either case, one still clings to the self, either through standing on nothingness and using nothing to extend the self as self, or fleeing from nothingness in hopes of preserving the self as self. however, in the third phase, these projects fall apart and the realization of the self as nothingness 24 nishitani, 33. 25 ibid. 26 ibid. 27 abe, 223. 24 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college becomes true freedom. no longer is nothingness viewed as the ground beneath the feet of the self, nor is nothingness seen as an alien invader impinging upon the self ’s being, but instead the self becomes the site of the realization of nothingness, or, “the unattainable.”28 while one may have legitimately said during the second phase that ‘the self is nothingness,’ the self, in this sentence, is still subject, and nothingness is still an object. in the third phase, by contrast, abe believes it more proper to say that “emptiness is the self.”29 the self becomes no-self because the unattainable is the true nature of the self. only in this state of no-self (non-ego) can all things be precisely what they are. in a seemingly ironic move, this emptying of our representations of emptiness (the negation of a negation) becomes the positive and full affirmation of all things, but of all things in their suchness and with no competition between them. this emptied emptiness of which abe speaks, nishitani calls ‘absolute nothingness’ (sunyata), and this absolute nothingness forms the basis of his ontology. at the point that one breaks through to the third phase of zen, one comes to realize that all things are the presentation of absolute nothingness. by this, nishitani does not mean to express an objectified nothingness like sartre, as if the ‘thing’ we encountered were composed of the material of ‘nothingness.’ rather, things spring up on their homeground in union with nothingness, which is to say, things are nothing at all. nishitani takes this to mean that the essential character of all things is ‘illusory.’ but he cautions us against taking this appearance as illusion to mean that there is something that dons an appearance, as if the things itself resided behind the appearance.30 no, the thing is itself precisely in its being mere appearance. to help us understand the identity of non-identity, nishitani employs the analogy of fire. what makes fire fire? that fire burns things seems essential to what fire is. yet, fire does not burn itself. so, fire is itself precisely in not being itself? non-fire is fire.31 this means that we can only say that the fire we experience on the plane of sense or reason is an illusion—but an illusion with nothing behind it simply is itself. the shapes that these illusions present to us emerge when things are uprooted from their home-ground and transferred into our consciousness.32 in other words, the emergence of each thing is an emergence in ekstasis from itself. 33 conversely, nishitani maintains that a thing must be known from within its “samadhi-being.” the word samadhi means ‘settling’ and refers “to the mode of being of a thing in itself when it has settled into its own position.”34 this concept was hinted at earlier, in relation to abe’s critique of self-consciousness as ‘self-centered.’ in the first and second stages, the self is self-centered because it takes things to be 28 abe, 9. 29 ibid., 13. 30 nishitani, 129. 31 ibid., 116. 32 ibid., 130. 33 ibid., 126. 34 ibid., 128. 25issue v f spring 2018 it was nothing what they are for the self; it makes itself the center. but nishitani says that all things are already centered in themselves. why, then, does abe consider a human’s selfcenteredness to be a problem? because self-centeredness presumes that other things are not settled within themselves and not sufficient unto themselves. the one who is self-centered has only understood half the truth and thus has missed the whole thing entirely. instead, nishitani says, “on the field of sunyata, the center is everywhere.”35 if the center is everywhere, each thing dwells upon its home-ground precisely in its suchness, with no competition between any beings. everything is exactly what it is. how can the center be everywhere? the concept of ekstasis helps elucidate how this might be. if the center is everywhere, then each thing is completely and utterly unique. this means that each thing remains the absolute center of all things. it is as though each thing is the master of all things. this is the half-truth that the self-centered consciousness grasps. but the self-centered self-consciousness has missed the other half entirely, for nishitani also says that each thing is simultaneously in the position of being the servant of all things.36 thus, each thing is both master and servant to all things. how can this be? “to say that a certain thing is situated in a position of servant to every other thing means that it lies at the ground of all other things…making it to be what it is and thus to be situated in a position of autonomy as master of itself.”37 here, on the field of absolute nothingness, every thing empties itself into every other thing, and is thereby fully itself in being fully not itself. “to say that a thing is not itself means that, while continuing to be itself, it is in the home-ground of everything else.”38 the corollary of this is that, when a thing is on its own home-ground, every other thing is there with it.39 every other thing becomes the constitutive element of everything else; all things are interconnected, and fully in harmony. we may think again of the example of fire being non-fire. because fire burns everything except itself, we can see that the essence of fire arises only in its interaction with other things. this means that fires finds its identity through its illusory appearance as not-itself, for this is precisely to be itself. everything is nothingness. nothingness is everything. every appearance is the appearance of nothing. every appearance of nothing is an illusion. every illusion is the true self. nothingness is the true self. we now have a clearer notion of what nishitani wants to do when he engages in dialogue with heidegger. though nishitani studied under heidegger, and even had discussions with heidegger about buddhism,40 he still believes that heidegger 35 nishitani, 146. 36 ibid., 147. 37 ibid., 148. 38 nishitani, 149. 39 ibid. 40 when nishitani was studying at freiburg in 1938, he gave heidegger a copy of d. t. suzuki’s essays in zen buddhism and heidegger invited nishitani over to his house in order to discuss the book because he had already read it! not only had he read it already, he was also eager to discuss it with nishitani, see graham parkes, 26 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college remained stuck within this second phase along with the rest of western nihilism. nishitani believes that, though heidegger’s philosophy is superior to sartre’s, heidegger had not escaped the representation of nothingness as an object. in the following paragraph, nishitani explicitly accuses heidegger of failing in this respect: nevertheless, nihility is still being viewed here from the bias of selfexistence as the groundlessness of existence lying at the ground of selfexistence. this means that it is seen lying outside of the ‘existence’ of the self, and therefore also as something more than the ‘existence’ or distinct from it. we find this, for example, in heidegger’s talk of self-existence as ‘held suspended in nothingness,’ despite the fundamental difference of this standpoint from other brands of contemporary existentialism or nihilism. the very fact that he speaks of the ‘abyss’ of nihility already tells us as much. in heidegger’s case, traces of the representation of nothingness as some ‘thing’ that is nothingness still remain.41 let us return to heidegger’s explication of anxiety in order to consider nishitani’s critique: that heidegger still represents nothingness as something that remains other than the self. as was said before, heidegger takes anxiety to be a mode of attunement that most clearly reveals dasein as that being that orients itself towards the world in terms of its possibilities. however, he notes that anxiety does this precisely by trembling and fleeing from manifest reality. in this way, the act of turning away would actually seem to be an act of objectifying nothingness, because any turning away always assume an object from which to turn away. however, doesn’t heidegger say that this nothingness from which dasein flees is ontically nothing and thus is not an object? this hearkens back to heidegger’s earlier assumption that those modes of attunement that flee from dasein reveal dasein in its primordial wholeness. however, we now have reason to question this claim, for is it not rather the case that to flee from something, one must precisely see it as a thing from which one can distance oneself? when dasein is awakened to its own nothingness in anxiety, it is awakened immediately to a nothingness from which dasein believes it can flee. anxiety labels the nothingness of pure possibility-of-being-in-the-world as a threat to its existence precisely because anxiety formulates this nothingness as that which it is not. this would seem to betray the fact that the nothingness called before the self in anxiety actually is an ontic representation of nothingness and not nothingness itself. this objectification serves only to enclose oneself in one’s self further, because anxious dasein reacts by fleeing back into absorption in innerworldy objects. anxiety as a mode of attunement reveals that nothingness is the ground of being, but objectifies this nothingness by turning away; thus, anxiety is unable to reveal absolute nothingness as nishitani defines it. so, is heidegger correct in stating that anxiety does reveal “nothing”? yes, and no. though heidegger takes anxiety to “introduction,” in heidegger and eastern thought, ed. graham parkes (honolulu: university of hawaii press, 1987), 10.   41 nishitani, 96. 27issue v f spring 2018 it was nothing reveal ontically nothing, this nothingness, which is given ontically (and therefore as an object), remains wholly inadequate for the task of revealing nothingness to us. anxiety cannot reveal the true nature of this nothingness because dasein makes this nothingness an object in its turning away from it. because dasein has objectified nothingness, it will find itself endlessly anxious about itself—generating precisely the state that zen seeks to transcend. with these considerations in mind, we can see that nishitani’s criticism of heidegger may have some teeth. however, a good heideggerian might reply that while heidegger does take anxiety to be the mode of attunement that brings dasein before itself in its primordial wholeness, he does not take it to be the most authentic orientation towards that wholeness. what if it were the case that anxiety, by being an inauthentic mode of attunement, constitutes the second phase of zen, but that an authentic orientation towards nothingness provides the path towards the enlightenment of the third stage? this reply would have us look at heidegger’s concept of being-towardsdeath, which he takes to be the authentic mode of being towards our thrownness and the way that one overcomes anxiety about being-in-the-world. however, before we even have a chance to consider being-towards-death as a possible solution, we must immediately confront a preliminary consideration that seems to be an insurmountable obstacle. we must tackle a singular and fundamental difference between the thought of heidegger and the thought of nishitani before we can make an adequate reply by using being-towards-death as the path towards the third stage. this difference hinges on the unique status that heidegger accords to human beings. if we were to phrase this problem as a question, we might ask, does the fact that dasein’s mode of being differs from that of other beings fundamentally prevent dasein from ever settling into its samadhi-being and from finding its homeground in absolute nothingness? can dasein, as long as it remains dasein, ever be truly emptied of self and comprehend its unity with all things in nothingness? this question arises due to the unique nature of dasein as that being that is concerned in its being about its being.42 heidegger takes dasein to be that way and chairs to not be that way, thus introducing a fundamental difference between conscious beings and inanimate beings. even though heidegger, in being and time, does not conclusively say whether dasein is simply a human mode of being or whether dasein is how all humans already are,43 we can at least say that heidegger intends to convey that the structures of dasein are specifically and peculiarly human. understanding (or “unconcealment”) only happens for dasein, and not for rocks. dasein understands itself and other things in terms of a horizon, and can intend relations between itself and others. however, this account of the structural features of a human’s mode of being42 heidegger, 191. 43 edith stein raises this insightful question in her masterful critique of heidegger’s thought, edith stein, “heidegger’s existential philosophy, translated by mette lebech,” maynooth philosophical papers, no. 4 (2007): 70. 28 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college in-the-world displays a fundamental divergence between heidegger and the kyoto school—a divergence that threatens to halt the discussion altogether. returning to abe’s diagnosis of why humans experience anxiety, we remember that abe sees the problem of anxiety fundamentally in terms of self-consciousness. if the zen practitioner takes self-consciousness to be the problem, what models of existence do we look to instead? zen leans heavily on examples from the natural world, employing earthy images like fire, water, trees, and stones. for zen, the problem is that anxious humans are not like these natural things. abe makes this clear when he contrasts human beings, who grow anxious through judging, with plants and rivers, which have no such problem. nishitani’s account of things as always already being settled in their samadhi-being explains why things like plants and rivers are without anxiety. in this way, we see that zen is interested not in explicating that humans are unique, but in explicating that humans cannot quite seem to fit in, and that they live in continual denial of how things actually are. they are anomalous, not special. if this is the case, heidegger seems to have found himself in a tight spot. as long as he is convinced that dasein is this being with this particular mode of being that is concerned in its being with its being, how can dasein possibly abandon that self-centered way of being-in-the-world, and become totally emptied so as to be constituted on the plane of absolute nothingness? is not dasein’s problem that it is dasein? for now, i have no answer to this question. i take this to be a fundamental rupture between these two thinkers and between their traditions. with that said, there are paths along which we may proceed to further our analysis and to inspire future dialogue. the path forward will lead us to explore how ekstasis functions in heidegger’s thought. in particular, heidegger’s account of the structure of dasein’s understanding as ecstatic warrants further investigation. the discovery that ekstasis is the primordial unity between dasein and the world may bear more fruitful dialogue with the kyoto school. that all things are absolute nothingness does not preclude the possibility that this nothingness is a dynamic nothingness. indeed, nishitani speaks of this absolute nothingness as a ‘force,’44 and a force bespeaks movement and process. a process can be nothing and everything at the same time, and dasein’s ecsatic movement may paint for us a useful picture of nothingness’ perpetual perichoretic motion. heidegger’s account of understanding finds its underlying motivation in the desire to articulate understanding, not as the correlation of beings understood in terms of object as mere presence, but as the un-concealment of dasein’s prior unity with other things.45 these relations are uncovered through care, which is another way of saying that what we care about commands our attention and thereby gives shape to our 44 nishitani, 163. 45 heidegger, 144-145, 200-201. 29issue v f spring 2018 it was nothing understanding.46 this orienting ourselves towards objects in terms of what concerns us reveals those underlying relations that were always already there. conversely, those relations that are brought to presentation through care must be grounded in a unity which is prior to the subject and the object in this relation.47 if one begins from the standpoint of either subject or object, one will find that neither subject or object can reach far enough to meet the other in the middle. both must possess a primordial oneness that founds the subject-object relation. this is essentially to say that the experience of knowing cannot be built up from the totality of the experience’s parts— as if the experience were a mere aggregate of information bits—but that knowledge arises only from the foundational plane of the oneness of all things.48 for heidegger, then, knowing is not merely an intellectual act but actually a coming to expression of our fundamental interconnectedness with the world. “[w]e must remember that knowing itself is grounded beforehand in already-being-alongsidethe-world.”49 knowledge can only arise from being-in-the-world, and thus being-inthe-world is prior to the plane of subject-object where knowledge gives an account of things. what role does ekstasis play in this account? heidegger describes the paradoxical nature of knowing in terms that strongly evoke notions of ekstasis: in directing itself toward… and in grasping something, dasein does not first go outside of its inner sphere in which it is initially encapsulated, but, rather, in its primary kind of being, it is always already “outside” together with some being encountered in the world already discovered…even in this “being outside” together with its object, dasein is “inside,” correctly understood; that is, in itself is as the being-in-the-world which knows.50 thus, he says, “dasein that knows remains outside as dasein.”51 so, dasein understands by being outside itself but is itself precisely in this being outside of itself? dasein’s inside is its outside and its outside is its inside. here i see a clearing toward which the thoughts of heidegger and nishitani may converge. heidegger’s statement that dasein knows its inside by being outside of itself calls to mind nishitani’s articulation that all things are related as both master and slave. if dasein knows by being outside of itself, then dasein can be said to be itself through residing in the home-ground of every other thing. yet by residing on the home-ground of everything (and thus being outside of itself ), dasein finds itself right at home on its inside. only because the center is everywhere can dasein simultaneously be its own center and also be in the center of everything else. 46 ibid., 145. 47 nishitani, 149 – 150. 48 heidegger, §44. 49 ibid., 61. 50 heidegger, 62. 51 ibid. 30 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college we may take another step further by connecting the master and slave paradox to the dynamic perichoretic movement of hermeneutics. paul ricoeur’s statement that, in hermeneutics, “i exchange the me, master of itself, for the self, disciple of the text,”52 conveys the ecstatic structure of hermeneutical understanding. i exchange the me, the ego-self, for the no-self, the servant of all things. when this exchange is made, one discovers how the hermeneutical circle traces the flow of nothingness. one is master of the text by being a servant of the text, and in becoming the servant of the text, one becomes its master. i lie at the home-ground of the text and the text lies at my home-ground. through our continually being constituted ecstatically, the unity we already had with each other and with all things can come to proper presentation. in the end, the conversation between heidegger and nishitani seems to run aground on the question of what sort of problem self-consciousness actually poses to us. is self-consciousness ultimately the problem, or is the problem a certain sort of selfconsciousness? nishitani seems to want to say that self-consciousness itself cannot be the plane on which the truth of things can be faithfully articulated, because selfconsciousness is the plane of discursive thought that traffics in the subject-object relation. heidegger seems to want to say that we have been dominated by one mode of self-consciousness (the metaphysics of presence), but that we, therefore, must seek the more primordial mode of self-consciousness that allows being to be un-concealed in understanding—that is, in care. however, the difference between heidegger and nishitani seems to originate in their respective religious traditions, rather than in mere philosophical disagreements. nishitani’s commitments reside in an ancient buddhist debate about whether plants can attain buddha-nature. in re-phrasing this question so as to reveal its underlying import, one might ask, “is enlightenment attained through practice or is enlightenment simply realizing what all things already are?” though initially there was debate between the tendai and shingon schools in japan, japanese buddhism eventually reached a consensus that all things already are buddha-nature (emptied of self ) and that enlightenment is simply realizing that one already is buddha-nature (a view referred to as hangaku53). standing in this tradition of japanese buddhism, nishitani sees the natural world as the exemplar from which we ought to learn, and to which we ought to conform. heidegger, on the other hand, displays the traditionally christian intuition that there is something fundamentally unique and special about human beings; that is, their being made in “the image of god.” the centrality of the imago dei in the jewish and christian faiths helps explain the western reflex to posit humans as somehow distinct in the community of beings. this idea that humans occupy some unique 52 paul ricoeur, hermeneutics and the human sciences, trans. john b. thompson (cambridge: cambridge university press, 2010), 73. 53 william lafleur, “saigyo and the buddhist value of nature, part 1.” history of religions 13, no. 2 (1973): 93128. my account of this question and historical debate comes from lafleur’s article, which does a masterful job at locating these questions in the historical tradition of buddhist reflection and then tracing them through the debates in japanese buddhist schools, which ultimately culminate in the buddhist poetry of the monk saigyo. 31issue v f spring 2018 it was nothing role amongst beings is evident even in the thought of the atheist sartre, who writes that humans are condemned to freedom—a phenomenon which seems to constitute the exciting risk and glorious terror of being human. heidegger’s account of dasein fundamentally presupposes that the way humans are in the world differs from the way that other objects are in the world, and that those different structures that we humans possess are actually to be celebrated. ultimately, this disagreement indicates that we can only answer these questions by thoroughly analyzing and re-envisioning the nature of the role of humans in the world of things. are they unique? how are they unique? is that a problem? is the difference perhaps not fundamental, but merely situated on a continuum that loops back on itself like a mobius strip? is the concept of “humans” itself a problematic concept? are we more like a process than a substance? we will need to confront such penetrating questions such as these if we desire to have any success dialoguing across the historical lines of east and west, and to secure a more just and beautiful way of being in the world. f bibliography abe, masao. zen and western thought. honolulu: university of hawaii press, 1985. heidegger, martin.  being and time. translated by joan stambaugh. albany, ny: state university of new york, 2010. lafleur, william. “saigyo and the buddhist value of nature, part 1.”  history of religions 13, no. 2 (1973): 93128. nishitani, keiji.  religion and nothingness. translated by jan van bragt. berkeley: university of california press, 1982. parkes, graham, “introduction.” in heidegger and eastern thought, edited by graham parkes, 1-14. honolulu: university of hawaii press, 1987. ricoeur, paul. hermeneutics and the human sciences. translated by john b thompson. cambridge: cambridge university press, 2016. stein, edith. “heidegger’s existential philosophy. translated by mette lebech” maynooth philosophical papers, no. 4 (2007): 55-98. 44 δι αν οι α cognition, domination and complexity: a speculative outline of intersections between cognitive activity and structures of control, and their relation to dynamics of complexity and simplicity ryan cardoza “organization is suppression.” 1 “life is founded upon the premise of a belief in enduring and regularly recurring things; the more powerful life is, the wider must be the knowable world to which we, as it were, attribute being.” 2 “morality of truthfulness in the herd. ‘you shall be knowable, express your inner nature by clear and constant signs—otherwise you are dangerous: and if you are evil, your ability to dissimulate is the worst thing for the herd. we despise the secret and unrecognizable.—’” 3 1 land, nick, interview by james flint. organization is suppression (february 1997) 2 nietzsche, friedrich. "will to power." in will to power, by friedrich nietzsche, 298. new york: random house inc., 1968. 3 nietzsche, friedrich. "will to power." in will to power, by friedrich nietzsche, 158. new york: random house inc., 1968. 45issue vi ◆ spring 2019 cognition, domination and complexity 1) introduction cognition and control are like two intertwined vectors of domination. to identify something is to bring it into one’s own order, so that it may become knowable— so that it may be suppressed into boundaries which facilitate a clear and unified apprehension of it. to implement a law of nature is to organize phenomena into something apprehensible; to conceptualize something is to integrate it into parameters of explication, and, thus, into the order of the knowable. the human, which is unaware of its fate as being doomed to want to know—being doomed to need to make knowable—gives names and systems to nature so that it might bring phenomena into its order of identification, thereby dominating them. a system of sovereignty is no different; an empire that expands inevitably makes territories and peoples known to it; the state makes its territory knowable by imposing categories of representation onto geographical spaces, making its citizenry knowable by bringing it into its order of domination—into its realm of identification, so that it might know it. functions of control and functions of cognition intersect in the sense that both employ techniques of domination, identification being but one of these techniques, albeit a very important one. the eyeball, which observes physical phenomena, and the eye of a surveillance camera, are both products of the same drive—they express the command “make knowable!” conquest is a word that commonly describes the trajectory of empires or states, but the order of knowledge, too, has a conquest: a trajectory of cognitive-intellectual imperialism. if it is observable to us, then it is not immune from systematization and integration into something cognizable. not even the stars are out of reach from the cold hands of knowledge, which bring them into the realm of identification, and which systematize their organizations, giving them names, and applying laws to their behavior. the story of control on earth is one whose trajectory is guided by concepts, which have a relative autonomy in the sense that the power of the concept is the power of the particular control system that incarnates it and that is guided by it. internal to every regime of domination is a cohesive conceptual structure that determines the way it operates and functions. a critical reconfiguration of a concept necessitates a substantial reconfiguration of the control structure that envelops it. i start with the following points, which will be expounded upon in what follows: 1) cognition and control converge at the point of the integration of materials into organized aggregates, the partitioning of matter into distinct categories of representation, and the selection out of what is not capable of being schematized. 46 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college 2) higher-level operations of unification and integration—whether operations of a regime or operations of mind—are conditioned by the possibility of very high degrees of stratification at the level of structural organization. 3) stratification is not only a condition, but is also a shared tendency between cognition and control; the double-helix of control and cognition are connected by a bridge of stratification. functions at the level of the mind and mechanisms at the level of political control integrate, systematize, and identify (which necessarily implies a form of stratification). 4) structures of political control have as their internal mechanisms relatively autonomous concepts. relative autonomy is established in contradistinction to absolute autonomy, in the sense that concepts are not unconditioned platonic ideas, but are rather relatively autonomous, since the concept guides the functioning of the regime, and the totality of the conceptual structure functions independently of any individual subject thinking or apprehending it. 5) concepts and materiality interact with one another through relations of feedback and interpenetration. 2) stratification in this paper, i will be using the definition of stratification provided by gilles deleuze and félix guattari, wherein stratification “consist[s] of giving form to matters, of imprisoning intensities or locking singularities into systems of resonance and redundancy, of producing upon the body of the earth molecules large and small and organizing them into molar aggregates. strata are acts of capture; they are like ‘black holes’ or occlusions striving to seize whatever comes within their reach.”4 stratification (when considered at the level of materiality) is the suppression and imprisonment of primary intensive matter. stratification at this level is the process whereby the indeterminacy and disparate potentialities of intensive material flux are suppressed into more rigidified and complex forms of determinate organization. when one refers to something that is stratified, he speaks about something that can also be said to have some degree of sophistication, which necessarily implies order. stratification will be a useful concept, because we can use it to talk about the convergence of certain tendencies two different levels of matter without equivocating between levels. the two levels at which stratification occur are 1) the level of human cognition/cognitive activity in general, and 2) the level of materiality. while stratification extends to both levels, the precise nature of stratification implemented at one level is not reducible to 4 guattari, gilles deleuze and felix. "a thousand plateaus; capitalism and schizophrenia ." in a thousand plateaus; capitalism and schizophrenia, by gilles deleuze and felix guattari, 40. minneapolis : university of minnesota press, 1987. 47issue vi ◆ spring 2019 cognition, domination and complexity the nature of stratification at the other level; there is no equivocation between levels, only an “isomorphism without correspondence”5 between the two. 3) scientific conceptualization; physics in his will to power, friedrich nietzsche writes that “thinking in primitive conditions (pre-organic) is the crystallization of forms, as in the case of a crystal.—in our thought, the essential feature is fitting new material into old schemas (=procrustes’ bed), making equal what is new.”6 according to nietzsche, when we refer to human thought, we undertake a process of integration and equalization. if we look at certain disciplines of human knowledge, we can see this tendency of “making equal what is new”7 in a very potent and effective register. physics is a practice that often proceeds by integrating different lines of information (different causal chains) into simple and unified schemata that explain these phenomena.8 in the case of isaac newton, the law of universal gravitational attraction is such a schema in the sense that it is meant to explain highly diverse phenomena. yet, the law itself is a mathematical simplicity of sorts—the inverse square law.9 the simplicity of the law integrates the phenomena it is meant to explain into a unified system of understanding. the parameters of a scientific law are imposed onto phenomena in order to facilitate a conceptual understanding that can be further built upon, and the application of a law forms a schema through which the particular phenomenon in question is translated and codified, in the hope that the schema itself can also continue to be engaged with as science develops. phenomena hitherto not understood by us become dominated; occurrences in nature are colonized and partitioned into territories that now belong to the sovereignty of knowledge. what’s interesting, however, about this integration of phenomena into unified understandings is that, in observing the materials upon which these laws are imposed on—such as the relations of the planets in orbit—there is nothing that suggests an essential simplicity that is absolutely independent of human cognition or perception. moreover, why is it that humans come to understand relatively diverse phenomena as implicitly capable of being integrated into a unified scientific or mathematical schema? we agree with nietzsche that the reason for this has to do with processes of integration and equalization as tendencies of cognitive functioning. the desire for more knowledge is the desire to integrate what is new into a schema that is further utilizable, and which can continue to be built upon. it is simply taken as a given that physical phenomena can be subjected to this process. 5 a thousand plateaus; capitalism and schizophrenia. minneapolis: university of minnesota press, 1987. 6 nietzsche, friedrich. "will to power." in will to power, by friedrich nietzsche, 273. new york : random house inc., 1968. 7 ibid. 8 for more on the relation between scientific laws and different causal chains,; see stewart, jack cohen and ian. "collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world ." in collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world, by jack cohen and ian stewart, 13-14. new york: penguin books, 1994. 9 ibid. 48 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college 4) identification a) partitioning at a level that is further removed from specificity of scientific conceptualization, there is the act of identification in general. to speak of identification is to speak of a connection between points; the connection between the agent who identifies and the matter that comes to be identified as a thing. identification is the mechanism that bestows thinghood onto matter. identification is also an example of stratification at the level of human cognition; to the extent that identification integrates in the same way that processes of stratification integrate indeterminate matter into a determinate form. identification is an action that selects out; the bestowing of thinghood onto matter implies the partitioning and selection out of any difference that would disrupt the simple continuities involved in the apprehension of a thing as a particular thing. that which is different—or that primary intensive materiality which would overturn thinghood as a category coextensive with representation – is partitioned outside of the territory of identification. any particular instance of identification effectuates a partition at two different levels: 1) at the level of things; in the sense that to identify a thing or an aggregate of things is to select out other things, which are not part of that particular occurrence of identification, and, 2) at the level of primary intensive materiality; in the sense that what is primary at a material level is made to be something of the outside. to be more precise, it is made to be of a transcendental delimitation that relegates it to a territory that cannot be seen or spoken of—primary materiality is encased within the parameters of a distinction whereby it becomes delimited to an “in-itself ” on the side of a transcendental barrier that is across from thinghood. to impose this type of inside/outside distinction is precisely to enact a partition onto matter. according to immanuel kant, ‘pure reason’ is a faculty that makes a similar partition. (this, indeed, is dependent on the extent to which we take kant to be saying that the phenomena/noumena distinction itself is an ‘idea of pure reason’.)10 the phenomena/noumena dichotomy is not a concept given through the categories of the understanding; rather, it indexes a point at which reason encounters a critical limit and produces this distinction in its striving to grasp an idea of which there cannot be knowledge. the idea in question is a world independent of our experience of it. in trying to conceive of this idea, thought becomes determined under such significant constraints that try to explicate the problem, which descends into deep conceptual rabbit holes. if it is true that we cannot know the things in themselves, then how can one speak in terms of a world completely independent of our experience, when to speak of a world is to speak within the parameters of our mechanisms of representation? and, as arthur schopenhauer (perhaps gratuitously) 10 for a more comprehensive and rigorous account of this partition and its implications, see kant, immaneul. critique of pure reason. new york: cambridge university press, 1998. 49issue vi ◆ spring 2019 cognition, domination and complexity pointed out, how can one speak of things-in-themselves when to speak of things is to imply multiple objects (the conditions for which are the inner intuitions of space and time)?11 a world independent of our experience would not contain multiple things that we cannot know—it would simply be unknowable altogether. but to follow this line of questioning is to miss the point completely. to speak about the problem strictly in terms of “we can/cannot know the things in themselves,” and to point out contradictions in the words being used to articulate it (like in schopenhauer’s case) wades into the pitfalls engendered by ‘dialectical reason.’12 (i. kant, transcendental dialectic, first book, on the concepts of pure reason 1998) (i. kant, second book of the transcendental dialectic, first chapter, the paralogisms of pure reason 1998) one could consider schopenhauer’s criticism: “how can you say thing in itself when even thinghood is something conditioned by out interaction with the world?” but this contradiction bespeaks the nature of the problem. it is precisely due to the nature of the possible pitfalls produced by this problem that kant knows to say very little about things-in-themselves or a world independent of our experience—he simply says that you may think it, but that you cannot cognize it. in this paper, i do not aim to take an extreme position on one side of the very famous and inflated philosophical divide that this problem precipitates. in fact, if kant were indeed correct, and if he were indeed saying what we take him to be saying, many of the philosophers who have fiercely articulated opposing positions of this divide have merely been bickering from two dyads of an antinomy of pure reason. instead, i am of the opinion that this idea of pure reason is a compelling example of partitioning at a transcendental level, which appears to be of something that has an extremely significant purchase on tendencies of thought. we do not take the fact that this inside/outside distinction is an idea of pure reason to mean that we cannot talk about processes that implicate such a partition; rather, we understand it to be a powerful example of this tendency that lends itself to the point that we are trying to make about the significance of partitioning as a feature of cognition. b) unification/complexity a thing is a type of simple unity that can be further integrated into other unified schemata of representation. if i am to identify an object that is in front of me, i can apprehend that object as a simplicity to the extent that it is totalizable in thought. i can integrate this object into a whole of compared and connected representations – a cognition, in the kantian sense of the word.13 not only does identification facilitate 11 schopenhauer, arthur. the world as will and representation. new york: dover publishing, 1969. 12 see kant, immaneul. critique of pure reason. new york: cambridge university press, 1998., specifically the sections; "transcendental dialectic, first book, on the concepts of pure reason." in critique of pure reason, by immanuel kant, 394-95. new york: cambridge university press, 1998., "second book of the transcendental dialectic, first chapter, the paralogisms of pure reason." in critique of pure reason, by immanuel kant, 438-39. new york: cambridge university press, 1998., and the section "transcendental dialectic." in critique of pure reason, by immanuel kant. in general, wherein illusion and fallacious inference of unrestricted pure reason is termed “dialectical.” 13 ibid. 50 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college more sophisticated operations of connecting and comparing representations, but the act of identification itself implicates the apprehension of simplicity to the extent that a thing is a unified simplicity. even if i can analyze and break down a thing into many different parts (or even different things), i will never stray outside the category of thinghood, and i cannot venture into the wilderness which identification partitions out without losing all semblance of thinghood and representation. underneath, however, the operations of simplicity lies a dense complexity that bears no resemblance to the identity of thinghood. contemporaneous with the apprehension of a simple identity such as thinghood are highly complex processes and firings at the molecular level of the brain. additionally, the brain itself is a highly complex structure with more densely layered intricacies in functioning than the most robust computer (currently, at least), and the brain is nested within the larger—but still highly complex—structure of the human body, which is far from short of coexisting and comingling systems of organization. the dense material complexity of the body is an example of a highly stratified structure, which functions as the productive conditioning for “higher-level” operations (in this case, operations of identification, cognition, representation) without resembling them. 5) conceptual regimes; societies of control in a short essay entitled postscript on the societies of control,14 deleuze identifies two distinct conceptual structures that accord with two distinct regimes of domination. at the time of writing the essay, according to deleuze, society was standing on a precipice that faces an auspicious horizon: the arrival of a new regime—control societies. the regime that michele foucault called the “disciplinary society” is progressively being phased out in favor of a regime with an essentially different conceptual structure.15 deleuze compares the structures of the two regimes and indexes distinctions that concern a difference of concepts. each of the two societies incarnates a distinct conceptual structure, and domination is effectuated in accordance to the structure of each particular concept. i believe that deleuze’s analysis and theoretical approach lend themselves to a concrete example of what we have been referring to as “conceptual regimes,” or regimes that are guided by concepts. the two concepts in question are not only a way to describe either regime, but they are also something that is said of each regime in a significant sense. below, we will briefly outline some of the structural differences that deleuze indexes in each regime. his allusion to the increasing level of complexity in the new regime also gives us another example of the dynamic between high degrees of stratification and simplicity. the distinctions between the two regimes discussed in the essay will be referenced in terms of identification, territory, and complexity. 14 deleuze, gilles. "postscript on the societies of control." october, 1992: 3-7. 15 ibid. “… a disciplinary society was what we already no longer were, what we had ceased to be. we are in a generalized crisis in relation to all the environments of enclosure – prison, hospital, factory, school, family.” 51issue vi ◆ spring 2019 cognition, domination and complexity identification: the precise manner in which each regime brings a citizenry into its order of identification presents two distinct cases. under the mechanisms of disciplinary societies, citizens are placed on one side of an individual/group partition, and are defined and identified by the regime in accordance with these limitations. the individual is determined in contradistinction to the group. but the workings of control societies facilitate an identification that is more abstract: “we no longer find ourselves dealing with the mass/individual pair. individuals have become “dividuals,” and masses, samples, data, markets or ‘banks.’”16 the aforementioned individual/ group partition no longer has a place in the primary conceptual mechanisms of control societies—operations of quantitative abstraction act on the populace such that they primarily become identified as abstract mathematical aggregates. territory: the spaces of disciplinary societies are analogically connected enclosures or molds. each enclosure is an independent variable that starts from zero. the individual is at school, now at work, now with the family; one “never stops starting” from zero.17 disciplinary societies consist in spaces in which the individual always starts from a blank slate in learning a new discipline (work, schooling, family). in contrast with this, societies of control are characterized by the continuous modulation of metastable states; one is always undergoing more training, preparation or schooling.18 the closures of disciplinary societies dissipate, opening wide onto a complicated, seemingly un-partitioned space of flux, continuity, and relationality that give themselves to power; there is no longer a political space because everything is now political; there is no space in which privacy exists to the extent that mechanisms of surveillance only become more and more sophisticated. the ‘public sphere’ is no longer a distinct, purely physical space, but rather becomes inverted and enmeshed with certain pockets of cyberspace. complexity/stratification and identity: the arrival of control societies at the impending end of the twentieth century bespeaks an omen which envisions a labyrinthine entanglement of connected serpent tails and cryptic vapors which conceal molecules of venom. the change from disciplinary societies to control societies indexes a distinct increase in complexity.19 (“the coils of a serpent are even more complex than the burrows of a molehill.”) the (conceptual) structure of the control regime is far more complex than the structure of the disciplinary regime it supersedes. this is also to say that control societies are more rigorously stratified than disciplinary societies. and it is none other than this dense level of stratification in terms of complex structural organization that facilitates the emergence of unified simplicities. a degree of stratification which is adequate to an idea of rigorous complexity is the condition for the possibility of emergent simplicities. in the particular case of a conceptual regime, 16 ibid. 17 ibid. 18 ibid. 19 “the coils of a serpent are even more complex than the burrows of a molehill.” ibid. 52 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college high complexity facilitates unifications and simplicities at the surface level of its functioning and instantiation. for, in fact, a corporation or a data is nothing more than one of these mysterious, “emergent” simplicities?20 and to the extent that it becomes a function of political tactics that are currently deployed within control societies, is identity not one of these simplicities? the current tactical use of identity in american political spaces is extremely ubiquitous, from racial identitarianism on the right, to identity as a compartmentalizing mechanism for groups which are purported to require activist assistance on the left. meanwhile, many people who claim they would like to move away from “identity politics” have no problem appealing to the abstract identity of the country, the equalizing power of which is apparently sufficient in subsuming any and all adversarial relations between groups. identity has become widespread as a political tool because the current parameters of domination under which we are determined facilitate the intensified instantiation of this vaporous simplicity. obviously, identity is an illusion that has long had a formal reality contemporaneous with the abstract and material processes of the brain. it just so happens that the complexity of the current regime determines its effectiveness as a political tool. this is not something that was present when deleuze was analyzing the characteristics of control societies. perhaps even this highly complex regime has reached its critical point of saturation. 6) complexity the body another complex structure, which facilitates the ‘functioning of unities’ like identity, is the human. humans are highly stratified organisms. it is this high degree of stratification at the material level—in this case, at the level of the body—that facilitates the capacity to identify and stratify at the level of cognition. in general, highly stratified systems have the capacity to produce sophisticated schemata of unified and simple understandings. the high level of material stratification in the body as a whole also facilitates abstract functions like identity, concepts, and conceptualization. the human body is a highly complex machine, even within just the eye/brain connection alone. in a procedure that requires a high amount of processing power, the brain creates the illusory experience of looking “through” one’s eyes. in reality, however, the retina—which is at the back of the eye—stops all light, and what appears as a continuity of colors and shade are in fact “pictures” or “frames” that are discretely captured and transmitted as electrical impulses by the retina’s nerve cells (and then sent to the brain).21 in the 1960s, david hubel and torsten wiesel proved that about half of the nerves that connect the eye to the brain are not simply passive receptors of light input, and that some fibers in the optic nerve actually convey highly complex 20 deleuze, gilles. "postscript on the societies of control." october, 1992: 3-7. “… but in a society of control, the corporation has replaced the factory, and the corporation is a spirit, a gas.” 21 stewart, jack cohen and ian. "collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world." in collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world, by jack cohen and ian stewart, 155. new york: penguin books, 1994. 53issue vi ◆ spring 2019 cognition, domination and complexity messages to the brain in the form of electrical impulses.22 we see in three dimensional dimensions, even though our eyes only receive input from two. this is because both halves of the optic tectum (also known as the superior colliculus in the literature, a structure common to the mammalian midbrain, which contains the neuronal visual pathways of both eyes) receive information from each eye—the right side of each retina sends its information to the left side of the tectum, and vice versa.23 the ear is another very complex organic device; the extremely small hair cells (of which humans have 15,000) on the basilar membrane are tuned to specific frequencies so that particular pitches are sensed at different positions along the cochlea.24 the cochlea is a “tuned receptor” that converts frequencies from vibrations of the eardrum to corresponding positions of vibration in the basilar membrane.25 the brain itself is an organ that also has a deeply intricate “structure.” the cerebrum consists of two cerebral hemispheres, and each hemisphere is connected to the other by thick bands of nerve fibers, with one larger fiber known as the corpus callosum.26 each hemisphere has approximately three layers; the first and outer layer (i.e. the cerebral cortex), the second and central layer, which is made up of white matter, and the third and deepest layer (also known as the basila ganglia), which is made up of gray matter.27 if we look deeper into the brain, we find other structures such as the thalamus or the hypothalamus. each sub-structure of the brain has its own intricate internal organization, and different sections of the brain correspond to different aspects of cognitive function.28 the body is certainly replete with order and organization, and to this extent, qualifies as a very stratified aggregate of matter. 7) concepts and materiality concepts are not precluded from interacting with materiality by virtue of their abstract level/function. this notion presupposes a framing of the distinction between the abstract and the concrete, which is unsustainable to the extent that it implies a relation of strict separation between the two. in reality, the abstract and the concrete are enmeshed within each other, and thinking is both a locus of convergence and an interpenetration between the two levels. i do not wish to imply that the abstract and that the concrete are not distinct or different from one another. rather, we are calling into question the precise nature of their separation. they can be thought of 22 stewart, jack cohen and ian. "collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world." in collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world, by jack cohen and ian stewart, 156. new york: penguin books, 1994. 23 ibid. 24 stewart, jack cohen and ian. "collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world." in collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world, by jack cohen and ian stewart, 158. new york: penguin books, 1994. 25 ibid. 26 stewart, jack cohen and ian. "collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world." in collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world, by jack cohen and ian stewart, 170-171. new york: penguin books, 1994. 27 ibid. 28 ibid. 54 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college as two different and distinct levels, each with its own distinctive order and dynamic. additionally, the concrete and the abstract can also be understood as levels that are significantly interconnected and always in relations of mutual interaction. there is a widely discussed phenomenon in science that can give us examples of how different levels of matter can, while remaining distinct and disparate, be internally connected to one another. this is what is typically referred to as emergence. for example; the gas laws, which are indexed by statistical properties, are determined by dynamics at a micro-level (which is to say a non-statistical level);29 pressure is measured by the average number of molecules in a given region of gas; temperature is the average kinetic energy of the gas molecules.30the simple apprehensible averages constitutive of the gas laws are produced by dynamics at a level of matter that is different in nature from the “emergent” level of statistical features. a complex molecular dynamic (in this case, the interactions and dynamics of the gas molecules) produces molar simplicities (the averages which constitute the gas laws).31 another popular example of emergence is the case of the mandelbrot set, in which a high degree of geometrical complexity is generated by “simple” dynamical rules that bear no resemblance to what they produce. there is no apparent connection between the dense intricacies of the mandelbrot fractal and the terse simplicity of the rules for making the mandelbrot set. these examples are meant to demonstrate scientifically observable instances of feedback and resonance between disparate levels of matter. the contention is merely that a similar relation between levels exists in the case of the abstract-concrete distinction, not that this instance is fundamentally the same in nature as these scientific examples. if we accept that there are disparate levels of matter that are nevertheless in a relation, then we can establish the two most relevant levels to the problem of the abstract/concrete distinction. there is a conceptual level—an order of matter purely concerned with concepts—and an explicitly material level of matter. the former corresponds to what one might think of as the abstract and the latter as the concrete. the cognitive activity of a human brain (material/concrete level) imposes partitions onto concepts, which transforms and reconfigures said concepts (conceptual/abstract level) until the reconfiguration of the concept affects activity at the material level of matter. there exists a counter-effectuation of concept and materiality; the cognitive activity of humans entails conceptual re-configurations, implemented partitions, and transformations at the purely conceptual level. these transformations make a difference, insofar as that cognition imposes partitions that entail a distinct change in what thought is interacting with (thought engages with a re-configured concept), as 29 ibid. 30 stewart, jack cohen and ian. "collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world." in collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world, by jack cohen and ian stewart, 233-234. new york: penguin books, 1994. 31 for various thorough conceptualizations of relations between “molecular” and “molar”, see a thousand plateaus; capitalism and schizophrenia. minneapolis: university of minnesota press, 1987., and anti-oedipus; capitalism and schizophrenia. minneapolis: university of minnesota press, 1983. 55issue vi ◆ spring 2019 cognition, domination and complexity well as in how it is functioning. thinking a transformed concept, as well as thinking the transformation of a concept, exacerbates different tendencies and intensities of thought. a concept always corresponds to a degree of intensity—or an intensive zone—to the extent that the concept is grasped within thought. to provide a rough mathematic sequence of what occurs, a reconfiguration in the concept = a change in intensity = thought traverses a new zone of intensity. to the extent that thought is something that occurs in the brain, a material difference made in thought necessitates a difference made in materiality in general. the difference is made not only at a molecular level—the material processes that occur in the brain—but also at a molar level; differences made in thought can cause people to take different actions, and to react differently to stimuli than they otherwise would have. to re-encapsulate the dynamic, thought subsists in materiality and in material processes (thought subsists in a brain). thought enacts transformations at the level of concepts, the transformation of concepts, and enacts a new difference in thought, which effectuates change at molecular and molar levels of materiality. outlining this dynamic of abstract and concrete levels and their relation to thought also sheds light on the precise nature of thought’s position. that is, thought is a point of convergence and interpenetration between the two levels. what is abstract is immediately apprehensible to thought and is cognizable a priori. mathematical universals are the best example of this: a right angle, a straight line, an equilateral triangle, all of which are perfectly cognizable a priori. these things are immediately apprehensible and graspable in thought, and they have their own order of necessity. i am perfectly capable of cognizing a straight line a priori, and the essence of the straight line is such that if i imagine three straight lines congruent with one another, they each form an equilateral triangle. however, one never encounters in experience (i.e. ‘the concrete’) a perfectly straight line. what is ‘concrete,’ on the other hand, is clearly and immediately grasped by mechanisms of perception. yet, there are things encountered in experience that are clearly not cognizable a priori (or, at least, not as easily as our straight-line example). the example that aristotle gives is “the snub nose.”32 a misshaped nose is something immediately perceived; however, we cannot grasp it in thought with the same efficacy as we do with mathematical universals. the abstract is concrete in thought, but the concrete is abstract to thought. if we relate this configuration of the abstract/concrete distinction regarding thought to our discussion of conceptual/ material orders of matter, we can also view the interaction of the two orders (concepts and materiality) in another equally valid way; concepts are something abstract, and engage, and deal with, the concrete abstractly, or by virtue of abstract connections. the cognition of an object is an action that is enmeshed within the territory of the concrete, but the activity of cognition entails the powers and aspects of the abstract, abstract faculties, and the powers of abstraction.(i am tentatively defining abstraction 32 for a similar distinction between differences in accessibility of the abstract and the concrete, see aristotle’s metaphysics. 56 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college here as the apprehension of abstract properties [the straight/straight line], which are coextensive with the cognition and experience of a concrete object.) 8) the implementation of concepts in a regime in order that a regime effectively realize the concept that is said about it, concepts must be configured and interacted within a particular way. this can be understood in terms of the conceptual-materiality circuit. the material order and the conceptual order must interact in order to implement conceptual structures into material structures of control. a partitioning and value distribution process must occur in terms of concepts in order for this to happen. this is something that is necessary for the regime to employ, since concepts apprehended at a purely abstract level are not sufficient for political instantiation. take something like equality: even though a dichotomous relation can be said of purely conceptual articulations of equality— to the extent that equal/unequal is an abstract conceptual principle—articulations that are exclusively of the conceptual level are obviously not insufficient for politics. the order of the abstract on its own is too cold for political dynamics; heat must be applied in order to set things in motion. a partition must be applied to the concept, and values must be distributed according to the partition. at the conceptual level, a stricter partition must be applied to equality; the partition is imposed as an overlay to the purely conceptual dichotomy (equality/inequality), and different values are distributed to the two sides of the instantiated partition. in accordance with the relation of feedback between levels, the implementation of this partition functions on the part of those material institutions that conceive of it, who, in turn, determine the concept of equality in a certain way. the determination of this concept effectuates how the political program carries out that conception, and in what manner it does so at the actual/concrete level. it might be objected that the aforementioned dichotomy of equal/unequal already invokes a type of conceptual partition, even though we are talking about it as if it is something different in kind from the partitioning process. this type of dichotomy exists completely a priori, so even if a partition is said about it, it is a partition that occurs at a level irrelevant/distinct from the political instantiation of concepts. pairs of a priori conceptual differences, such as straight/curved, discrete/ continuous, or equality/inequality, are not deliberate partitions on the part of any given subject or regime. it would be more accurate to say that they are conceptual dichotomies that incarnate tendencies and internal limitations in thought. 9) conclusion; complexity – the order of knowledge and nihilism if we are told that the arrow of time necessarily corresponds to an increase in disorder, then the trajectories of both control structures and the domain of human knowledge would exemplify a tendency that does not accord with this postulate. the arrow of time that follows the trajectories of our control-cognition double helix also appears 57issue vi ◆ spring 2019 cognition, domination and complexity to correspond with a progressive increase of order rather than disorder over time. deleuze’s example of control societies alludes to this—political domination begins to become more complex, more sophisticated. even before the control society, the modern state in general appeared to index something particularly sophisticated and abstract. what exactly is the state? it is not completely physical since many of its important functions (such as law and rights) are not concrete. yet, despite not being completely physical, it clearly exists, and disobeying the injunctions of this thing that is not completely physical still has concrete material consequences (such as going to jail or paying a fine). on the other side of the double helix, the body of human knowledge becomes extremely saturated with systems and sub-systems of organization. knowledge considered as a total body is not only a system of informationpreservation and organization. it is also like a gigantic complex of interlocking and communicating systems. different intellectual disciplines communicate and interact with one another, often forming new sub-disciplines. sometimes there is even a synthesis that produces a completely novel field. even as older schemata become phased out or invalidated by new discoveries, archaic systems or ideas sometimes resonate with newer scientific projects, and can be re-integrated and updated into contemporary scientific practices. the order of knowledge is like an expanding but increasingly detailed web whose parallel lines resonate and communicate with one another. different sections of the web are sometimes folded into and connected to other parts of the web, yet, the structural totality retains its distinct parts, and the entire thing continues to increase in size and detail. however, as this web becomes more and more detailed, a corresponding dynamic arises that is different from the other dynamics contemporaneous with complexity that we touched upon earlier. this web of knowledge possesses within it unified simplicities, but there is no higher-level simplicity that emerges on behalf of this sprawling structure of complexity. in the complexity of the human body/brain, we have something like identity, as well as abstract operations of identification and cognition. in the practice of science, which is an activity within the body of knowledge, we have the conceptualization and unification of phenomena under laws of nature. with the increased complexity of control societies, we witness the emergent function of certain mechanisms like corporations, data sets, and code. where is the level of unification that corresponds to this highly stratified body of knowledge? there does not appear to be a connected level of unified simplicities and/or abstractions that corresponds to this complex web. however, this does not mean that there is no a corresponding dynamic related to the increasing order in the body of knowledge. as knowledge becomes more saturated with order, another tendency intensifies in connection with the former dynamic. if one looks up for a corresponding process of unification at a higher level, it looks like nothing is there. but if one looks down below, he will find that there is nothing. there seems to be a flattening effect; something becomes liquidated, something is increasingly becoming 58 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college leveled. the progressive acquisition and articulation of abstract universals on behalf of knowledge causes the implementation of a concrete universal of disenchantment among those organisms that are supposed to be its inheritors. the more about the world that is rigorously explicated and systematized on behalf of knowledge, the more that we seem to feel as if something that once deeply belonged to us is being expropriated from us before our very eyes. in fact, there seems to be almost no limit to what can be expropriated from our most cherished, personal intuitions about ourselves as they become articulated and codified into the colder, more impersonal territory of knowledge. this is because processes of knowledge and intelligence disintegrate, and what is being disintegrated are the givens upon which we have constructed very useful fortresses of illusion and ignorance that keep us sheltered from the outside. rather than producing a corresponding dynamic of unification, the trajectory of knowledge effectuates a dynamic of the intensified disintegration and destruction of unities —the destruction of givens which knowledge finds to have never existed in the first place. the liquidation of the ‘given’ opens humanity up to the absolute indifference of a universe that does not consider humankind to be nearly as important as it finds itself. looking to a universe that operates with complete autonomy (but with no knowledge), we find ourselves on the other side of that chiasmus, as something endowed with knowledge, but with little to no autonomy. in understanding itself to be determined by impersonal and autonomous processes which lack knowledge, something which possesses knowledge apprehends its own lack of autonomy. paradoxically, the condition of possibility for cognizing such a disparity is a condition that is produced by the autonomous—by a blind god. as the structure of knowledge becomes more saturated with order and detail, nihility coagulates and rises from the core of the earth, oozing through the cracks in the surface, melting the ground below us. but there is nowhere to go but further down. ◆ 59issue vi ◆ spring 2019 cognition, domination and complexity bibliography deleuze, gilles. "postscript on the societies of control." october, 1992: 3-7. guattari, gilles deleuze and felix. "a thousand plateaus; capitalism and schizophrenia ." in a thousand plateaus; capitalism and schizophrenia, by gilles deleuze and felix guattari, 40. minneapolis : university of minnesota press, 1987. —. a thousand plateaus; capitalism and schizophrenia. minneapolis: university of minnesota press, 1987. —. anti-oedipus; capitalism and schizophrenia. minneapolis: university of minnesota press, 1983. kant, immaneul. critique of pure reason. new york: cambridge university press, 1998. kant, immanuel. "second book of the transcendental dialectic, first chapter, the paralogisms of pure reason ." in critique of pure reason, by immanuel kant, 43839. new york: cambridge university press, 1998. kant, immanuel. "transcendental dialectic ." in critique of pure reason, by immanuel kant. kant, immanuel. "transcendental dialectic, first book, on the concepts of pure reason ." in critique of pure reason, by immanuel kant, 394-95. new york: cambridge university press, 1998. land, nick, interview by james flint. organization is suppression (february 1997). nietzsche, friedrich. will to power. new york: random house inc, 1968. nietzsche, friedrich. "will to power." in will to power, by friedrich nietzsche, 158. new york: random house inc., 1968. nietzsche, friedrich. "will to power." in will to power, by friedrich nietzsche, 298. new york: random house inc., 1968. nietzsche, friedrich. "will to power." in will to power, by friedrich nietzsche, 273. new york : random house inc., 1968. schopenhauer, arthur. the world as will and representation. new york: dover publishing, 1969. stewart, jack cohen and ian. "collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world ." in collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world, by jack cohen and ian stewart, 13-14. new york: penguin books, 1994. 60 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college stewart, jack cohen and ian. "collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world." in collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world, by jack cohen and ian stewart, 155. new york: penguin books, 1994. stewart, jack cohen and ian. "collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world." in collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world, by jack cohen and ian stewart, 156. new york: penguin books, 1994. stewart, jack cohen and ian. "collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world." in collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world, by jack cohen and ian stewart, 158. new york: penguin books, 1994. stewart, jack cohen and ian. "collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world." in collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world, by jack cohen and ian stewart, 170-171. new york: penguin books, 1994. stewart, jack cohen and ian. "collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world." in collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world, by jack cohen and ian stewart, 233-234. new york: penguin books, 1994. 75issue vi ◆ spring 2019 δι αν οι α patočka's critique of husserl: the possibility of a-subjective phenomenology1 gabriel vidal phenomenology embodies the project of founding a new philosophical departure, one detached, if possible, from the mistakes—and especially of the biases—of former traditions and serves as a proper philosophical foundation.2 the founder of this tradition, edmund husserl, proposes breaking with the subjective excesses of idealism and the naïve schemes of realism. this implies the task of debunking two theses: on one hand, the idea that the subject is the creator of the objects that appear to him and, on the other, the idea of the absolute independence of objects, or the thesis of the thing in itself.3 the path taken by husserl in order to debunk both theses aims to restore the connection between the two dimensions at stake—subjectivity, and objectivity—by putting at the forefront their correlation. to do this, we must abstain ourselves from anticipating any unproven thesis in our investigation and exclusively refer back to the description of appearances in themselves. this is because everything that has the slight possibility of entering into our consideration does so 1 this article contains quotes that are originally in spanish. all translations have been made by me in this case. 2 david woodruff smith, “phenomenology,” in the stanford encyclopedia of philosophy, ed. edward n. zalta, summer 2018 (metaphysics research lab, stanford university, 2018), https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/ sum2018/entries/phenomenology/. 3 this mainly refers to kant’s thesis as outlined in critique of pure reason immanuel kant, critique of pure reason, ed. paul guyer and allen w. wood (cambridge: cambridge university press, 1999). however, it does not only refer to kant’s interpretation, but to whatever doctrine that considers the object as completely independent of a subject’s knowledge or experience. 76 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college insofar as it appears, and thus only the ways things appear will bring light to the mentioned correlation. phenomenology asks us to attend exclusively to what is given in our description of it. staying in this dimension of primitive donation4 of content is what gives phenomenology its rigor, to which husserl remains faithful in the creation of this new science. nonetheless, many posterior phenomenologists have criticized husserl for overemphasizing one of the two poles of the correlation—namely, the subjective— and so accusations of subjectivism became commonplace in transcendental phenomenology.5 the appearance seems to be constantly described in terms of a donation towards and made by the consciousness of a subject, and the acts by which the subject point to objects, but not the other way around.6 the problem is that most of the successors have simply disregarded husserl’s point of view, and have restarted the task from mostly different considerations without taking into account his foundational concerns. jan patočka is one of the few authors who has revised the foundational problem of phenomenology from a properly husserlian approach to mind. if we agree on the fact that husserl was successful in setting the foundations of phenomenology, then we could claim that, if those foundations are incorrect, then further developments of phenomenology are completely misguided. however, if we can correct husserlian phenomenology from its mistakes while keeping the foundation unaffected, then we can be reassured of phenomenology’s future. this is why the possibility of phenomenology itself may be at stake under patočka’s criticism. if phenomenology, since its inception, already carried a bias in favor of subjectivism, then it was doomed to be a failed attempt at a new departure from former tradition. patočka’s intention is, indeed, to correct this misguided inclination towards subjectivism in husserl’s account, while keeping the fundamental features of phenomenology that allow us to recognize it as unaffected. i will proceed in showing the most important elements of husserl’s phenomenology: constitution, epoché and reduction, the husserlian description of perception, and the noesis/noema scheme. then, i will show patočka’s attacks to the previously mentioned points and how these critiques reveal a subjectivist tendency in husserl, specifically in the gesture of reduction. finally, i will demonstrate patočka’s proposal of an a-subjective phenomenology that dispenses with reduction and explores a world-horizon as the a priori background of appearances. 4 the original word is “donación”. it means something like “to be given as it is”. when a content is given to consciousness, or makes its presence into it, that’s a donation or (donación). 5 robert j. dostal, “subjectivism, philosophical reflection and the husserlian phenomenological account of time,” in phenomenology on kant, german idealism, hermeneutics and logic: philosphical essays in honor of thomas m. seebohm, ed. o. k. wiegand et al. (dordrecht: springer netherlands, 2000), 53, https://doi. org/10.1007/978-94-015-9446-2_4. 6 george alfred schrader, “philosophy and reflection: beyond phenomenology,” the review of metaphysics 15, no. 1 (1961): 92. 77issue vi ◆ spring 2019 patočka's critique of husserl ii. husserl’s phenomenology the necessity of showing the correlation is first seen in logical investigations,7 where husserl engages in a critique of psychologism, which he claims reduces the logical dimension to that of empirical psychology, and completely disregards its apodictic and ideal character.8 in order to elucidate this issue, husserl traces a distinction between the acts, which allows thoughts about content, and the contents themselves, whereas psychologism reduces all logic only to the acts.9 in this way, he shows that the same content can be conceived of, by employing completely different acts of thought (for example, the number “5” can be given to consciousness from conceiving five points as well as five lines). this demonstrates that in order to elucidate the issue of both the ideality and empirical reality of math and logic, it is necessary to pay attention to the correlation of contents and acts in a completely unbiased way, without advancing any thesis about it. therefore, the inquiry will be about how it is possible that these ideal entities appear in consciousness, or how the apodictic can make its way “inside” something that is singular and contingent. the issue is solved when it is realized that, although ideal entities make their way into consciousness by means of acts, “the subject cannot constitute whatever signification, so constituent acts depend on the essence of the objects in consideration.”10 here, the concept of constitution is discovered. that is, contents appear; they are not constructed, but are rather brought into presence. constituent acts are “what makes the object representable” and “do not entail anything else but the act of going out to encounter the entity, in such a way that this entity, in the same act by which it is encountered, can announce itself.”11 this way of conceiving the donation of objects makes husserl think of consciousness differently. consciousness is always a consciousness of something, such that the content of its consideration always accompanies it.12 it is not a closed-in-itself structure that is then filled with contents, but it is in itself the pointing towards the object. that activity defines consciousness’ essence. this is pure direction of consciousness towards the object—or intentionality—is the only thing that we can properly affirm about consciousness.13 this allows husserl to affirm that constitution does not equal the construction of the object: the act is not, in some way, the absorption of the object inside a closed in consciousness, but is rather the appearance of the object to 7 edmund husserl, logical investigations (routledge, 2013). 8 dan zahavi, husserl’s phenomenology (stanford university press, 2003), 8–9. 9 robert hanna, “husserl’s arguments against logical psychologism,” edmund husserl: logische untersuchungen, 2008, 78. 10 walter biemel, “las fases decisivas en el desarrollo de la filosofía de husserl,” in husserl. tercer coloquio filosófico de royaumont (buenos aires: paidós, 1968), 46. 11 ibid., 47. 12 carlo ierna, “making the humanities scientific: brentano’s project of philosophy as science,” in the making of the humanities. volume iii: the making of the modern humanities, ed. rens bod, jaap maat, and thijs weststeijn (amsterdam university press, 2014), 547. 13 a. david smith, “husserl and externalism,” synthese 160, no. 3 (2008): 319–20. 78 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college an intentional consciousness (the object is pointed by intentionality and makes its presence). i have said that in order to describe ‘appearance as such,’ one must attend to what is given, refraining from fabricating conjectures outside that pure donation. this motivates husserl, in ideas i,14 to pin down what this refraining attitude consists in. he calls this the epoché, and by means of this epoché, we can: put out of action the general thesis which belongs to the essence of the natural standpoint, we place in brackets whatever it includes respecting the nature of being: this entire natural world therefore which is continuously ‘there for us”, ‘present to our hand’, and will ever remain there, is a ‘factworld’ of which we continue to be conscious, even though it pleases us to put it in brackets.15 this does not imply the denial of the existence of the world, but implies, rather, its independence as a reality in itself. in this case, it would be possible for the world to be independent of any constituent act. denying this thesis, then, allows one to make the world appear to an intentional consciousness instead of speculating about it without evidence. what appears to the intentional consciousness constitutes evidence,16 and what does not appear to it is just subjective construction. so, one can see that the epoché not only implies a suspension of the thesis of the independence of the world, but that it also implies a reduction to the intentional field of consciousness.17 in fact, everything that appears into our consideration does so insofar as it is assessed by this intentional field, which the epoché only takes out of its anonymity. by being faithful to this epoché, we do not make conjectures about what appears; we only describe what appears before the intentional field through constituent acts. if anything is to possess phenomenological validity, then a constituent act is required. this is what commitment to the epoché means: being faithful to the phenomenological reduction by always asking for the constituent act of the object in question.18 later in his endeavor, husserl again describes perception under the new concepts reviewed in the section above. after we commit to epoché, we develop a consciousness that points to objects in a completely equal correlation, where the object is neither created by the subject nor exists in a partial transcendence. therefore, now the description of perception, reduced to the intentional field of consciousness, no longer risks becoming either subjectivism or realism. therefore, perception will be constituted by three stages: hyletic, noetic and noematic. the hyletical stage refers to hylé as the basic matter of perception; namely, the pure sensation that makes no 14 edmund husserl, ideas: general introduction to pure phenomenology (routledge, 2014). 15 ibid., 110. 16 ülker öktem, “husserl’s evidence problem,” indo-pacific journal of phenomenology 9, no. 1 (may 1, 2009): 3, https://doi.org/10.1080/20797222.2009.11433986. 17 steven crowell, “phenomenological immanence, normativity, and semantic externalism,” synthese 160, no. 3 (2008): 339. 18 husserl, ideas, 364. 79issue vi ◆ spring 2019 patočka's critique of husserl reference to any object whatsoever, in the purely experienced sensation.19 in this sense, it consists of a cogitatio that is a mere ingredient of consciousness, where the ingredient is what makes the private current20 of the subject’s experiences. this purely immanent hylé is later animated by noesis, which is the stage in which the purely experienced becomes a trait of a thing.21 for example, the pure green becomes the green of a leaf. in this stage hylé no longer makes reference to itself, but instead points towards an object. in this stage, intentionality starts operating and allows consciousness to get outside of itself. finally, noesis allows the noema to enter, which is the pointed object donated by an intuition.22 in the noetical moment, we point to the object, which by means of intuition, then allows the object to make itself present in the noematical stage. we can even describe falsity and truth within this schema: i can point noetically towards something that does not present itself noematically. in other words, i prepend a signification that does not correspond to the given intuition. only when the signification is filled with a corresponding intuition does the constitution of the object become successful.23 although the former description underlies an effort to attribute equal importance to the subject and object roles respectively, it probably seems that the object is given only by means of acts of consciousness. thus, it becomes dubious if things that appear to the subject are transcendent to it. there is a chance that everything will be components of consciousness. husserl solves the issue by introducing the concept of foreshortening.24 there’s a substantial difference between merely immanent experiences and proper perceptions. immanent experiences are given in a completely adequate way to the subject; they are conceived in a completely transparent way.25 in other words, the thing is immediately and completely ended in all its possibilities of being perceived by the subject. perceptions, on the other hand, are always only shown partially; one can never end all the possible perspectives that the object has to offer.26 this means that perceptions are given inadequately. this foreshortened way of being brought into presence guarantees its exteriority since “an experience is only possible as a living experience but not as anything spatial.”27 19 patrick whitehead, “phenomenology without correlationism: husserl’s hyletic material,” indo-pacific journal of phenomenology 15, no. 2 (october 26, 2015): 6, https://doi.org/10.1080/20797222.2015.1101830. 20 by ‘private current’ i mean the subject’s own flow of consciousness that is available only to himself. his thoughts, emotions, mental images and other things in motion constitute this private current. 21 kenneth williford, “husserl’s hyletic data and phenomenal consciousness,” phenomenology and the cognitive sciences 12, no. 3 (september 1, 2013): 502, https://doi.org/10.1007/s11097-013-9297-z. 22 ibid. 23 lambert zuidervaart, “synthetic evidence and objective identity: the contemporary significance of early husserl’s conception of truth,” european journal of philosophy 26, no. 1 (2018): 125, https://doi.org/10.1111/ ejop.12192. 24 the original term for this mode of appearance is abschattung, and it refers to things that are given as not showing all of its sides. the reference painting tries to portray the idea of an unfinished sketch or perspective. renaud barbaras, introducción a una fenomenología de la vida: intencionalidad y deseo (encuentro, 2013), 43. 25 juha himanka, “husserl’s two truths: adequate and apodictic evidence,” phänomenologische forschungen, 2005, 93. 26 maría paredes, “percepción y atención. una aproximación fenomenológica,” azafea: revista de filosofía; vol. 14 (2012), 2014, 84–85, http://revistas.usal.es/index.php/0213-3563/article/view/11680. 27 husserl, ideas, 41. 80 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college here, the distinction between acts and contents is raised again: even though the thing is given through multiple and different foreshortenings, it nevertheless points towards a unique object. perception is already accompanied by the realization that the perspectives refer to the same object. we do not need to complete all the possible perspectives, nor do we need the mediation of a secondary abstraction or to provide a metaphysical explanation for this realization. in other words, the unity of the object is already given in perception by the many perspectives. this is called apprehension unity.28 both the possibility of the unity of the object and the foreshortened exteriority guarantee that things are not created by the subject. however, this is not a completely transcendent transcendence29 in the sense that does not imply the independent existence of a world, but, rather, it implies exteriority for the intentional consciousness. in this sense, the external constitutes a transcendence inside immanence,30 which is verified thanks to unprejudiced scrutiny of appearance that, therefore, it is inclined neither towards the subjectivist idealist thesis nor the realism of things in themselves. iii. patočka’s critique we must emphasize that, for husserl, in the act of perception, only experiences are components of consciousness. perception as such, however, including the foreshortenings and apprehension of unity, has an objective character. this betrays, according to patočka, the explanation that husserl himself proposed as a distinction for experiences and perception. husserl says that the foreshortened donation of things guarantees the external character, and, so, everything that is given adequately constitutes consciousness’ components. indeed, foreshortenings are given to the subject as empirical data, which lacks signification. but in the case of what is also supposed to be given as objective—namely the apprehension of unity—the donation is neither forefronted nor empirical data, “but apprehension itself is affirmed; it is not any affluence of new sensations, but it has the character of an act, a mode of consciousness or a state of the spirit.”31 since apprehension itself does not correspond to any proper intuition and is nothing empirical, one must conclude that constitutes signification itself. as such, it has the character of being an act of the subject and appears with the same apodictic evidence that is characteristic of the subjective experience. therefore, apprehension taken as such corresponds to an adequate 28 smith, “husserl and externalism” 326. 29 by ‘transcendent transcendence,’ i mean that the objectivity or externality of the thing has to resort to something that is beyond (or outside of ) consciousness. this is why it is a ‘transcendent transcendence’, and is directly opposed to ‘immanent transcendence’ (a husserlian notion), which assures the externality of the thing without resorting to something beyond consciousness. 30 dermot moran, “immanence, self-experience, and transcendence in edmund husserl, edith stein, and karl jaspers,” american catholic philosophical quarterly, may 1, 2008, 268, https://doi.org/10.5840/ acpq20088224. 31 jan patočka, el movimiento de la existencia humana (encuentro, 2004), 103. 81issue vi ◆ spring 2019 patočka's critique of husserl experience (not a foreshortened one) so that there is nothing indicating its external or objective character: to summarize: sensations and the acts that apprehend them or perceive them are lived, but they do not appear objectively; they are not seen, heard or perceived with any «sensory faculty». we have before our eyes husserl’s subjectivism in germinal state.32 these critiques demystify the supposedly objective character of apprehension of unity and, therefore, it loses its status as a perception, since apprehension is not an intuition of anything, but an act of signification, void of any empirical content. in light of this, apprehension enters the field of what constitutes consciousness, assuming we are faithful to husserl’s own explanation: subjective being does not foreshorten, it merely shows itself as what it is. therefore, in the first place, the phenomenical sphere is divided into two stages: what appears in its modes of being given, on one hand, and the supposed subjective basis of this appearance, on the other hand.33 in his project, husserl restarts the former conception of consciousness, which is characterized by considering the subjective modes of being as intramental and the objective as extramental—or, in husserlian terms, what is component and what is spatiotemporal. though patočka doesn’t explicitly elucidate how this critique affects the noema/noesis schema, it can be easily understood. noesis as such is not empirical; it is an animation of data that imbues noema/noesis with the capacity to have a direction towards an object. due to this lack of empirical data—and the possibility of being foreshortened—one concludes that noesis is an adequate experience, a component. noesis, thus, takes the side of the subjective (and noema of the objective), and the appearing process splits in two again. finally, this confusion irradiates to hyletical data, since one cannot determine if they are components or foreshortenings. there are two equally probable answers: hyletical data are either foreshortened perspectives that acquire signification thanks to noesis, or they are components of consciousness that become externally directed thanks to noesis. the aforementioned misunderstandings and contradictions rest, however, in a more fundamental mistake, according to patočka. the great achievement of husserl is, indeed, the discovery of the “phenomenological field” and the birth of describing the appearance as such in that field, but: it is true here that husserl has not abandoned the fundamental idea of a general correlation between appearances and what appears, he has even reinforced and elevated the entire philosophical endeavor to the methodical. however, a curious combination of cartesian and kantian ideas alongside the original idea of an intuitive foundation of knowledge 32 ibid. 33 ibid., 105. 82 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college that transcends argumentation lead here to the idea of a phenomenological reduction to the pure immanence of consciousness.34 indeed, husserl tries to attend to appearances as such and to correlation, but when he tries to constitute this knowledge as a rigorous science, “he attempts, in a curious analogy with the cartesian concern with doubt, to methodically highlight and secure this dimension.”35 the procedure chosen to do this, for descartes, implies remitting to the apodictic dimension of the subject. in other words, the reduction to pure immanence is fundamentally an alternative term for the subjective, since it relies on an equal correlation of subject and object, and is thereby accompanied by the additional claim because it is an intentional field. but as was aforementioned, claiming its intentional nature does not solve the problem—the correlation of subject and object is always marked by the objectifying acts of the subject. this means that intentionality is only directed from the subject to the object, but not vice versa. all things considered, we find that the classical bifurcation of the world is accidentally replicated, now in the distinction between what is component and what is spatiotemporal. this is a dichotomy that intentionality alone cannot dissolve—it merely transports it. one could say that in order the prevent the claim of an in-itself world, husserl constantly refers to the appearance of the former only for a consciousness, but this has resulted in reducing appearances to the subjective experience, without considering the possibility that admitting that the autonomy of the phenomenical field is not equivalent to restarting the thesis of the thing in itself. the merely methodological commitment of evading the thing in itself started to slip into more serious claims of subjectivism. husserl, in fact, tries to describe appearances as such, and is aware that in order to describe the universal a priori of correlation, it is not possible to reduce appearances as such to any of the entities that appear in this field. that would imply the absurd claim that the appearance itself depends on the things that this field produces. however, in order to evade the thesis of the thing in itself, husserl relies excessively on the dimension of immanent consciousness, in which he finds that there is complete and indubitable evidence. so he ends up relying completely on the self: the intention points, therefore, to appearances as such, to the phenomenical sphere. but this intent is sketched in terms that come from the sphere of the subjective: he tries to speak about a reduction to pure immanence instead of putting on display the field of appearances as such.36 even though its initial motivation is always to stay true to the correlation, objectivity ends up being defined as “something that appears in living and is transcendent to 34 ibid., 114. 35 ibid., 106. 36 ibid. 83issue vi ◆ spring 2019 patočka's critique of husserl the ingredient stream of experiences.”37 in this way, the constitution of things— which claims to debunk that objects are created by consciousness or that things in themselves exist independently—is impossible if we do it from the presupposition that everything is put under the assessment of the immanence of intentional consciousness. it can be said, then, that this “transcendence inside immanence” fails: ultimately, the whole problem of constitution is irresolvable. how can ‘living as such’, as it is originally given in reflection, start to make something an objective, transcendent appearance? one cannot have intellectual evidence about it—it can only be accepted as a brute fact. nothing should be questioned about it if it were not, in fact, an ultimately intuitable fact, but rather, an authentic fact, and not a construction.38 indeed, husserl’s conjecture that the psychic is internal comes, according to patočka, from brentano’s interpretation of cartesianism: if the intentional object is not immanent but precisely transcendent to the subject, and the brentanian apprehension of the psychic as an internal object remains, then it follows, necessarily, that the fundamental distinction is between lived experience and phenomena. living experience does not appear, but is already there as a component that flows through time and causes the appearance of things. by virtue of living experiences transcendences appear.39 this means that the subjective (psychic) is not one of the many kinds of entities that appear by means of the appearance as such, but, rather, is a privileged dimension that is the cause of the appearance in general. by this mistake, the procedure of epoché is also misunderstood because it is presupposed that epoché implies a “reduction” to the immanence of the subject. this is based on the misguided belief that if consciousness is intentional, then it is no longer closed in itself because is only direction towards the object. however, this is not possible if the psychic/internal mode of conceiving it is not abandoned. if not abandoned, the transcendent and immanent restart the intramental/extramental distinction that it purports to overcome.40 iv. patočka’s proposal from the critique previously sketched, it is clear that the main attack resides in the understanding of the investigation of appearance as reduced to the immanence of consciousness. this produces all the problems that, in the end, are attributed to subjectivism. however, it is true that the investigation of appearances requires a 37 ibid., 107. 38 ibid., 108. 39 ibid., 124. 40 husserl pretended to demonstrate that sources of knowledge for phenomenology were not internal nor external biagio g. tassone, “the relevance of husserl’s phenomenological exploration of interiority to contemporary epistemology,” palgrave communications 3 (july 11, 2017): 8. 84 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college disconnect from any possible thesis about the world41 and must remain faithful only to describing appearance as such: […] phenomenology itself should be a science: an a priori science of the essential legalities that govern the appearance process of what appears as such […] it is not an argumentative basis that resorts to the self as the ultimate explicative concept, but a revealing foundation that legitimizes the idea of foundation as such.42 if phenomenology is supposed to be given the task of describing appearances as such, then this appearance cannot be based on one of the entities that appear, since that would require what is needed for explanation to reside within the explanation. from this point of view, both the subjective and the objective are things that made its presence in the phenomenological field as any other. this phenomenical field is, therefore, autonomous,43 it is the condition of possibility for the apparition of every entity, but this field itself is no entity. husserl’s mistake is reducing it to one of the entities that appear: there is a phenomenological field, a phenomenological being itself, which cannot be reduced to any entity that appears within it. therefore, it can never be explained by the entity, even if this is objective, as in nature, or subjective, as in the self.44 it follows that in order to describe appearances as such without biases, one must abstain from positing any thesis that we had with respect to appearance. that is precisely the role of the epoché, which “[…] claims that a thesis is neither attempted nor purported, but that one only experiences the freedom to use it or not to use it.”45 it does not follow, however, from this abstention, that one should commit to a “reduction”; this requirement is added by husserl in order to bring himself back to an indubitable sphere. in this sense, the reduction to the sphere of the self should actually be one of the theses that we should abstain ourselves from positing. thanks to this way of thinking about the epoché, patočka considers the possibility of posing a new question: “what would happen if the epoché did not stop before the thesis of the own self, but was understood as completely universal?”46 if epoché becomes completely universal now, it can open the way for ‘appearance itself ’ to make its appearance, without the obstacles of taking it as being originated from the self. in fact, “maybe the immediacy of the donation of the self is not a prejudice and the experience of one’s own self, just as the experience of external things, has its a priori, 41 oded balaban, “epoché: meaning, object, and existence in husserl’s phenomenology,” in phenomenology worldwide: foundations — expanding dynamics — life-engagements. a guide for research and study, ed. a. ales bello et al. (dordrecht: springer netherlands, 2002), 111, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-0473-2_10. 42 patočka, el movimiento de la existencia humana, 113. 43 dušan hruška, “patočka and english sensualism and its place in modern philosophy,” folia philosophica 37, no. 0 (july 4, 2016): 28, http://www.journals.us.edu.pl/index.php/folia/article/view/4732. 44 patočka, el movimiento de la existencia humana, 129. 45 ibid., 244. 46 ibid., 247. 85issue vi ◆ spring 2019 patočka's critique of husserl an a priori that allows the appearance of the self.”47 so, if we make epoché universal, we gain two things at once: freeing ‘appearances as such’ from the chains of the self and, by doing so, revealing the authentic essence of this previously misunderstood self. if we want to unfold this a priori, which is a condition for the possibility of the subjective as well as the objective, then we must universalize epoché in such a way that “it is a phenomenology void of reduction, but not without the epoché.”48 in other words, it is an a-subjective phenomenology. this renouncement of reduction now allows us to open the phenomenological field as such, as an autonomous a priori, to whom objects and subjects appear on the same grounds: “we arrive in this way to the conditions of possibility of the appearance of what already appears; we do not remain quiet before what appears, but we allow appearance to make its appearance.”49 this phenomenological field is no longer a mere stream of experiences, but a world-background, a vast horizon of meaning that only manifests, shows and bring things to presence: a universal structure of appearance that is not reducible to what appears, in its singular being, is what we call world, which we have the right to name, since it is found in the epoché. however, it is neither negated nor doubted by the epoché, but brought into the light, and out of anonymity, by it.50 thanks to an epoché void of reduction, appearances as such can be unfolded, showing itself as a proto-horizon of the world “in an infinity that cannot be updated. perception does not flow in a sequence of more and more perceptual donations, but, from the beginning, it rests on a totality that is present even when is not being perceived.”51 in other words, a particular actualization of that horizon of totality does not account, on its own, for the fact that there is something. this, however, is already manifested by the fact that “the universal totality of what appears, which patočka sometimes calls ‘unapparent immensity,’ belongs to the own structure of appearance, which means that every appearance is necessarily a co-appearance of that totality.”52 every particular appearance presupposes this infinite world background as the condition of its possibility in such a way that one must conclude that this world is neither objective nor subjective, but a-subjective. this way of conceiving the world allows patočka to formulate an original conception of the subject. patočka points to descartes as the discoverer of the cogito, which is the subject revealed to itself by means of its own acts, through its existence.53 descartes 47 ibid. 48 ibid., 249. 49 ibid., 247. 50 ibid., 248. 51 ibid., 29. 52 barbaras, introducción a una fenomenología de la vida, 139. 53 jan patočka, “the natural world and phenomenology,” in jan patočka: philosophy and selected writings (chicago: university of chicago press, 1989), 247. 86 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college attempts to add a thing-like essence (a thing that acts, thinks, and wants),54 in such a way that constitutes a special thing between other things that lack a self or ego. this introspectionalist55 way of conceiving the object motivates him to consider the subject as something internal, a closed-in-itself ego to which external objects oppose is inherited by brentano,56 and, finally, by husserl. instead of this ego, patočka will emphasize the cogito: without a doubt, the ‘ego’ as ‘ego cogito’ is proven to be immediately true. but this certainty lacks any content, except for this: it is that which appears that makes its appearance. the phenomenological field appears before this ego.57 this does not mean, however, that the cogito is the foundational entity of appearance, because as we have already said, appearance cannot be reduced to any entity. what patočka is trying to say is that the subject acts only as an organizational center58 of this protohorizon of world. the subject is, in some way, the indexical of appearance—the ‘here’ of appearance.59 it indicates the direction of the appearance, but appearance always ontologically precedes the subject and presents itself before him, not through him: showing itself in him is no human doing: man neither produces nor shows its own being (its own ‘light’) or its own transparency, the interest for it or its own comprehension. in one’s own being, being in general is already in action.60 now, the essential features of the subject become available through phenomenological description. by means of this, we discover that the subject is an entity in the world whose fundamental ontological feature is that it “cares for its being and exists through time and in movement. this points even beyond the sphere of the self.”61 this entity lives within the possibilities of appearance and clings to them in its existence, in such a way that its being is explained by the phenomenical field, but not the other way around.62 thanks to this conception of the subject and appearance, now patočka can replace the husserlian account of perception with his own corrections. in patočka’s account, it is not the case that different perspectives appear and then are unified by an act of 54 rené descartes, meditations on first philosophy: with selections from the objections and replies (oup oxford, 2008), 20. 55 ibid., 97-98. 56 dermot moran, “the inaugural address: brentano’s thesis,” proceedings of the aristotelian society, supplementary volumes 70 (1996): 2. 57 patočka, el movimiento de la existencia humana, 129. 58 ibid., 248. 59 indexicals are terms that have a demonstrative function, namely, they indicate direction, place, position, etc, relative to a context or point of reference. paradigmatic cases are “here” and “now”. david kaplan, “demonstratives,” in themes from kaplan, ed. joseph almog, john perry, and howard wettstein (oxford: oxford university press, 1989), 490. 60 patočka, el movimiento de la existencia humana, 110. 61 ibid., 111. 62 barbaras, introducción a una fenomenología de la vida, 157. 87issue vi ◆ spring 2019 patočka's critique of husserl consciousness. what is actually the case is that before me appear characteristics that “i attribute to the thing itself as its own notes and others that, although they are also there, they are not there as belonging to the thing, but, in some way, as helping the thing appear.”63 some of the data exist as a property of the thing and belongs, and the rest of the data lack reference to that thing, which is not a property of the thing itself. this means that two types of data, which are equally objective, appear to me, at least in the sense that they are different to me. however, some of it appears with confusing traits, or lacks reference to its object. characters that appear as belonging to a thing are thing-like traits, and the ones that lack reference to its object are nonthing-like traits. thing-like and non-thing-like traits are just as objective, and for non-thing-like characters to become thing-like characters, an act of the subject is not necessary. patočka compares this to the image of awakening from a dream, in which even “before what is being lived shows contours of things to me, sensations overwhelm me as i am passively taken by them. does not something very different to things appear there; namely, a chaos, a fog, but all of that in an objective way?”64 finally, the noesis/noema scheme is also corrected. as we saw before, this scheme implies putting beforehand an empty signification (noesis) that needs to be corresponded by an intuition (noema). the mistake here is to consider this empty signification as an act of the subject, instead of as a structure of a-subjective appearance. what is actually the case is that there is a universal structure of emptiness/fulfillment that is not limited only to perception, and is not an act of any subject, but always operates every time a negative meaning is asking to be completed: “it can also happen that any object, existent thing, or thing-like process fails to appear.”65 conclusion i have demonstrated that patočka’s critique (and many of the subjectivist accusations made towards husserl) can be held, since they reveal many presuppositions that operate in the background of husserlian theories of appearance. the fundamental conclusion from this critique is that the epoché does not imply reduction. thus, we can envision an a-subjective phenomenology that reveals the independence of a world-horizon without restarting the natural attitude towards the world. nonetheless, this correction to husserl’s project is not a mere disregarding, but is, rather, a correction that keeps and shows the true aspect of many of husserl’s theories. in a certain way, we can see patočka as an inheritor who critically continues the task started by the first phenomenologist. patočka expresses this intent, saying that: 63 patočka, el movimiento de la existencia humana, 126. 64 ibid. 65 ibid., 132. 88 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college maybe the last will of the creator of phenomenology should be considered: effecting the catharsis of the phenomenological and giving back to phenomenology its original sense of an investigation of appearances-assuch.66 ◆ bibliography balaban, oded. “epoché: meaning, object, and existence in husserl’s phenomenology .” in phenomenology world-wide: foundations — expanding dynamics — life-engagements. a guide for research and study, edited by a. ales bello, m. antonelli, g. backhaus, o. balaban, g. baptist, j. bengtsson, j. benoist, et al., 103–14. dordrecht: springer netherlands, 2002. https://doi. org/10.1007/978-94-007-0473-2_10. barbaras, renaud. introducción a una fenomenología de la vida: intencionalidad y deseo. encuentro, 2013. biemel, walter. “las fases decisivas en el desarrollo de la filosofía de husserl.” in husserl. tercer coloquio filosófico de royaumont, 35–57. buenos aires: paidós, 1968. crowell, steven. “phenomenological immanence, normativity, and semantic externalism.” synthese 160, no. 3 (2008): 335–54. descartes, rené. meditations on first philosophy: with selections from the objections and replies. oup oxford, 2008. dostal, robert j. “subjectivism, philosophical reflection and the husserlian phenomenological account of time.” in phenomenology on kant, german idealism, hermeneutics and logic: philosophical essays in honor of thomas m. seebohm, edited by o. k. wiegand, r. j. dostal, l. embree, j. kockelmans, and j. n. mohanty, 53–65. dordrecht: springer netherlands, 2000. https://doi. org/10.1007/978-94-015-9446-2_4. hanna, robert. “husserl’s arguments against logical psychologism.” edmund husserl: logische untersuchungen, 2008, 27–42. himanka, juha. “husserl’s two truths: adequate and apodictic evidence.” phänomenologische forschungen, 2005, 93–112. hruška, dušan. “patočka and english sensualism and its place in modern philosophy.” folia philosophica 37, no. 0 (july 4, 2016). http://www.journals. us.edu.pl/index.php/folia/article/view/4732. husserl, edmund. ideas: general introduction to pure phenomenology. routledge, 2014. 66 ibid., 109. 89issue vi ◆ spring 2019 patočka's critique of husserl ———. logical investigations. routledge, 2013. ierna, carlo. “making the humanities scientific: brentano’s project of philosophy as science.” in the making of the humanities. volume iii: the making of the modern humanities, edited by rens bod, jaap maat, and thijs weststeijn, 543–554. amsterdam university press, 2014. kant, immanuel. critique of pure reason. edited by paul guyer and allen w. wood. cambridge: cambridge university press, 1999. kaplan, david. “demonstratives.” in themes from kaplan, edited by joseph almog, john perry, and howard wettstein, 481–563. oxford: oxford university press, 1989. moran, dermot. “immanence, self-experience, and transcendence in edmund husserl, edith stein, and karl jaspers.” american catholic philosophical quarterly, may 1, 2008. https://doi.org/10.5840/acpq20088224. ———. “the inaugural address: brentano’s thesis.” proceedings of the aristotelian society, supplementary volumes 70 (1996): 1–27. öktem, ülker. “husserl’s evidence problem.” indo-pacific journal of phenomenology 9, no. 1 (may 1, 2009): 1–14. https://doi.org/10.1080/20797222.2009.11433986. paredes, maría. “percepción y atención. una aproximación fenomenológica.” azafea: revista de filosofía; vol. 14 (2012), 2014. http://revistas.usal.es/index. php/0213-3563/article/view/11680. patočka, jan. el movimiento de la existencia humana. encuentro, 2004. ———. “the natural world and phenomenology.” in jan patočka: philosophy and selected writings, 239–74. chicago: university of chicago press, 1989. schrader, george alfred. “philosophy and reflection: beyond phenomenology.” the review of metaphysics 15, no. 1 (1961): 81–107. smith, a. david. “husserl and externalism.” synthese 160, no. 3 (2008): 313–33. smith, david woodruff. “phenomenology.” in the stanford encyclopedia of philosophy, edited by edward n. zalta, summer 2018. metaphysics research lab, stanford university, 2018. https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2018/entries/ phenomenology/. tassone, biagio g. “the relevance of husserl’s phenomenological exploration of interiority to contemporary epistemology.” palgrave communications 3 (july 11, 2017): 17066. whitehead, patrick. “phenomenology without correlationism: husserl’s hyletic material.” indo-pacific journal of phenomenology 15, no. 2 (october 26, 2015): 1–12. https://doi.org/10.1080/20797222.2015.1101830. 90 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college williford, kenneth. “husserl’s hyletic data and phenomenal consciousness.” phenomenology and the cognitive sciences 12, no. 3 (september 1, 2013): 501–19. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11097-013-9297-z. zahavi, dan. husserl’s phenomenology. stanford university press, 2003. zuidervaart, lambert. “synthetic evidence and objective identity: the contemporary significance of early husserl’s conception of truth.” european journal of philosophy 26, no. 1 (2018): 122–44. https://doi.org/10.1111/ ejop.12192. 29issue vi ◆ spring 2019 δι αν οι α phenomenological reproduction in thompson and mailer's new journalism brendan chambers “the truth is no more nor no less than what one feels at each instant in the perpetual climax of the present.” – norman mailer, “the white negro” in his classic essay, “the new journalism and the image-world: two modes of organizing experience,” david eason sought to distance interpretations of new journalism from what he saw as the facile, superficial description of its resemblance to novelistic writing, and to create a more complex conception of the relationship between style, culture, and consciousness. he argued that the widespread view of new journalism as literary journalism (particularly as propounded by tom wolfe) “abstracts the reports from their cultural contexts [… giving] only passing attention to the experiential contradictions represented in many of the reports.”1 within his own formulation, eason proposed instead that we think of two countervailing subdivisions within this body of work, each reflecting a different approach to conceptualizing the relationship of reporter to the cultural fragmentation of the 1960’s and 1970’s. in so doing, eason established categories that influence critical discussion to this day.2 eason called the first of these approaches “ethnographic realism.”3 this mode aims to enter a group and “constitute the subculture as an object of display,” from whence “the reporter and reader, whose values are assumed and not explored, are conjoined 1 eason, david l. “the new journalism and the image-world: two modes of organizing experience” in critical studies in mass communication (1984), 52. 2 for instance, robert alexander’s analysis of thompson’s fear and loathing in las vegas’ role in the history of narrative journalism, or norman k. denzin’s work describing performance ethnography. 3 eason, “the new journalism and the image-world: two modes of organizing experience,” 51. 30 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college in the act of observing,” work “to reinvent textually the consensus which cultural fragmentation had called into question.”4 this approach, exemplified by the work of tom wolfe, effectively places the reporter and his reader outside of a given event (or cultural moment, as eason was more wont to describe it), and in the passive role of bystander, observing without participating. by unifying them in this role, the text positions both reader and reporter within a shared culture and value system, often appropriating obsolete codes of understanding to do so. scenes and subcultures are made accessible to the reader only by depicting him in relation to the (assumed) shared dominant cultural framework. positioned in that way, the journalist then penetrates the world of the other, affording the reader with a passage into its hidden reality. in eason’s view, ethnographic realism, at its core, largely sought to assuage the fears of mainstream audiences about the fracturing of society by comparing what appeared to be new and frightening cultural changes to supposedly similar movements of the past: in wolfe’s case, for instance, linking the worryingly impenetrable symbolic world of ken kesey’s ‘merry pranksters’ to the base human religious impulse. to eason, this explanatory role also disguised an unequal power dynamic between reporter and reader. though they are unified in the assumed shared cultural understanding, writer and reader are often simultaneously placed on uneven ground, with the reporter in a paternal role, guiding the reader from ignorance to understanding.5 eason terms his second variant of new journalism—the one that will interest me in the following pages— “cultural phenomenology.” this approach takes in some ways an entirely opposite angle in addressing cultural fragmentation. it not only acknowledges, but also embraces the mindset that “there is no consensus about a frame of reference to explain ‘what it all means.’”6 it equivocates on calling any one experience “reality,” instead sitting with the “experiential contradictions represented in many of the reports.”7 finally, it joins together reporter and reader in the co-creation of a reality, engaging in a “multi-level interrogation, including that between writer and reader.”8 in contrast to ethnographic realism, this collaborative construction by reader and author puts both on a more equal footing, reflecting the cultural values of the time period that produced it. while ethnographic realism can exist at any time, cultural phenomenology is representative of a specific cultural moment; it is a manifestation and product of the 1960’s and early 1970’s, a time when “the doctrine of representation had crumpled [and] the center which separated image and reality were not holding.”9 each approach reflects a methodology of understanding, a means to the end of reckoning with an unrecognizable world. 4 ibid., 52. 5 ibid., 54. 6 ibid., 52. 7 ibid., 52. 8 ibid., 52. 9 ibid., 51. 31issue vi ◆ spring 2019 phenomenological reproduction as eason suggests, the divergent means of “coming to terms with disorder” in the rapidly changing media world are reflected in the meta-analyses that crop up in each style.10 as mas’ud zavarzadeh explains in his mythopoeic reality, given the expansion and diversification of mainstream news media in the 1960s, readers grew to be wary of any text that sought to totalize experience, which presented a singular, universal understanding of events, as both traditional literature and reportage had. in zavarzadeh’s telling, they began to eschew anything that presented a single, solid “harmonizing principle behind manifold reality.”11 instead, readers often sought what new journalism offers: a self-conscious, self-aware approach to representation, which recognizes the limitations of individual experience and makes explicit reference to them, so as to most accurately present information to the reader. more traditional forms of ethnographic realism attempted to keep pace with these changes, though it often left little room for the reader to decide whether the journalist’s representation was accurate, taking that truth-claim as a given. ethnographic realism often creates the illusion that the processes of its creation could produce nothing other than an objective representation of reality, despite the sculpting necessarily done by matters of selection, point of view, and so on. i see eason’s conception of cultural phenomenology as the opposing approach, calling attention to the inherent limitations of its form and method. it is not only cognizant of these limitations, but it also makes use of them in order to investigate, in conjunction with the reader, the possibilities available to construct a world “rooted in the interaction of ‘images of reality’ and ‘the reality of images.’”12 if asked to distill the distinction between the two styles to a single phrase, i nominate authorial self-reflexivity. cultural phenomenology recognizes the existence and effects of this liminal image-world13 on writing itself and any attempts, therefore, to represent such a world. by taking stock of the contemporary cultural moment, and the effects of the proliferation and dissemination of media, writers using a culturalphenomenological approach are careful to track the effects that the image-world have on their own actions and the events that they attempt to report. this reciprocity within eason’s second model—which is quite similar, as he acknowledges, to what zavarzadeh terms a “testimonial” approach to nonfiction novel writing—even shapes the decisions of the journalist as he is writing.14 if, for example, norman mailer changes his behavior to conform to, or to challenge, the constructed media image of norman mailer, then that image influences his account of “the real.” in this way, the author serves as a vehicle to represent our new lives simultaneously in the world, and 10 ibid., 54. 11 zavarzadeh, mas'ud. the mythopoeic reality: the postwar american nonfiction novel. (university of illinois press, 1976) 12 eason ““the new journalism and the image-world: two modes of organizing experience,” 55. 13 for the purposes of this paper, the image-world is “a realm which blurs the distinctions between fantasy and reality,” one which challenges the traditional dichotomy of image and real, instead imagining “a world in which image and reality are ecologically intertwined” (eason 54, 53). in practice, this is the conception of reality, formed through the consumption of media and experience, which exists in the collective consciousness of society. 14 zavarzadeh, the mythopoeic reality: the postwar american nonfiction novel, 128. 32 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college outside of it, in the image-world. the distinction between the two—to this historical point well-established—has, in response to reality’s conceptual fragmentation, become blurred. understandings of reality influence understandings of the self; thus, the self must now be understood to be similarly fractured, or lost in the liminal space that our “technotronic society” has opened between the image and the real.15 i will now examine how eason’s phenomenological method and zevarzadeh’s testimonial approach16 are manifested in the works of hunter s. thompson and norman mailer. i will examine how thompson’s fear and loathing in las vegas and mailer’s armies of the night conform to—and/or complicate—the categories that eason postulates. i am interested in the reciprocal manipulation of artistic practice and public image in both writers, as well as the relation of that manipulation to each authors’ claims regarding epistemological authority. additionally, i will explore both authors’ use of writing as a reconstitution of self, using the lens of eason’s conception of cultural fragmentation as a point of departure. this question is critical to reckoning with the full scope of their works, as the centrality of self is an inherent characteristic of subjective reportage. hunter s. thompson’s fear and loathing in las vegas embodies eason’s description of cultural phenomenology as a “symbolic quest for significance in a fragmenting society.”17 las vegas’s image-world increasingly fractures the supposed object of his quest—an “american dream” now irreparably divided into bike racers at the mint 400, the police at the national conference of district attorneys, or the various outcasts and addicts who populate the city’s casinos and fringe—making the search for concrete, universal truth increasingly more suspect and improbable. the actual quest thus becomes thompson’s own struggle—and, at times, a fruitless quest—to establish new avenues for epistemological authority by constantly shifting stylistic modes and journalistic strategies. thompson’s “savage dream” both exposes and displays the inconsistencies inherent in his own storytelling so as to construct more truthfully a new, fragile and even “failed” reality with his reader.18 it is impossible to say definitively whether thompson intended the process for this work as a rhetorical strategy, that is to say, understood the impossibility of finding a universal framework through which to unify his subjects. but what is certain—or, at least, what most critics believe19—is that thompson embraces this disunity, working to document “what it feels like to live in a world in which there is no consensus about 15 zavarzadeh, 1. 16 the testimonial nonfiction novel, as zavarzadeh terms it, “assumes that the only authority on appearance and existence is the witness himself.” in other words, that the author’s epistemological authority derives from presence at an event, and that the only information that can be conveyed with absolute authority is that which was registered by “one’s participating senses” (128). 17 eason, “the new journalism and the image-world: two modes of organizing experience,” 52. 18 in his “jacket copy to fear and loathing to las vegas: a savage journey into the heart of the american dream,” thompson describes the work as a “failed experiment in gonzo journalism.” 19 see, for instance, hollowell, john. fact & fiction: the new journalism and the nonfiction novel. (university of north carolina press, 1977), 11. 33issue vi ◆ spring 2019 phenomenological reproduction a frame of reference to explain ‘what it all means.’”20;21 because of this, he makes forays into a variety of avenues for authority, seeking a method of communication that can convey experience. thus on a diegetic and conceptual level, fear and loathing in las vegas serves simultaneously as a representation of the new “supramodern” world and as a documentation of thompson’s attempts at recording it.22 thompson’s ultimate task, of course, is to establish the disunity of american society in the ’60s and ’70s and to articulate the absence of a unifying cultural framework (represented in fllv by the american dream). after eating at terry’s taco stand, near the end of their ostensible quest, duke and gonzo reach what is left of the club they think is called the american dream, finding only “a huge slab of cracked, scorched concrete in a vacant lot full of weeds,” and are informed that “the place had ‘burned down about three years ago,’” leaving little interpretation necessary for the reader.23 it is not by accident that thompson chose las vegas as the backdrop for this tale of fragmentation. the city is the preeminent example of what eason calls “the marketing of worlds of experience,” and, therefore, is the ideal place to bring into question “the relativity of all worlds, including one’s own.”24 las vegas is also a perfect example of the bidirectional influence of the image-world, where “image and reality are ecologically intertwined.”25 full of neon lights, unsavory spectacles, and uninhibited hedonism, las vegas is the “vortex” of the american dream, a grotesque paradise and a world of its own.26 these excesses of las vegas of course influence its image, but to the same degree the collective perception of the city as a haven for vice and excess forces it to cater to this conception, the reality thus changing to conform to the image. the same transformative process occurs through thompson’s strategy of internalizing the image-world into a distorted caricature of his own identity. raoul duke is famously a rum-guzzling, drug-frenzied maniac: the “gonzo” journalist. even thompson’s so-called “biographies” document a self that has morphed into that gonzo identity, as thompson and his constructed image became inseparable.27 20 fear and loathing in las vegas was originally serialized in two parts in rolling stone magazine in 1971 and 1972. as thompson describes it, he intended to travel to las vegas and cover the mint 400, “to buy a fat notebook and record the whole thing, as it happened, then send in the notebook for publication—without editing.” instead, he laid the foundation for the work during “about 36 straight hours in [his] room at the mint hotel…writing feverishly in a notebook about a nasty situation that i thought i might not get away from” which was then compiled over the next six months at the behest of his editor, and put into print later that year. 21 eason, “the new journalism and the image-world: two modes of organizing experience,” 52. 22 zavarzadeh, the mythopoeic reality: the postwar american nonfiction novel, 1. 23 thompson, hunter s. fear and loathing in las vegas: a savage journey into the heart of the american dream. (random house, 1998), 168. 24 eason, “the new journalism and the image-world: two modes of organizing experience,” 51. 25 ibid., 53. 26 thompson, fear and loathing in las vegas: a savage journey into the heart of the american dream, 47 27 the biography written by e. jean carroll, for example, opens with a schedule of thompson’s daily drug use, beginning: 3:00 p.m. rise 3:05 chivas regal with the morning papers, dunhills 3:45 cocaine 34 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college this image is constructed to a strategic end, however. by suffusing his writing with alternating mania and introspection, thompson places himself in the tradition of the blind prophet, a strategy that stretches back to tiresias, one who ostensibly cannot see, but who, in fact, “sees” better than most. visionary hallucinations afford the opportunity to place the symbolic in the real without straying too far into the realm of the fictional: a hotel lounge full of humanoid lizards cannibalizing one another stand as a report of thompson’s true lived experience, while simultaneously representing an allegorical understanding of las vegas’ patrons. in thompson’s visionary brand of new journalism, therefore, individual experience remains the highest source of epistemological authority, even as its hallucinatory style testifies to the author’s refusal to attempt a supposedly “objective” representation of reality. he eschews presenting a “harmonizing principle behind manifold reality,” instead working constantly to remind the reader of the constructedness of the very identity that bears witness to a surreal narrative.28 throughout fear and loathing, for example, thompson inserts small tags that allude to his process of creating the story, but they are themselves documents of immersion, chaos, haste and disorder: they are the notes from which he constructs his account, scribbled on “a pocketful of keno cards and cocktail napkins,” or on the handful of ink splotches splattered throughout the text, as if the pages the reader holds were torn straight from thompson’s handwritten journal.29 likewise, he includes qualifiers such as “as i recall” and “memories of this night are extremely hazy,” so as to be candid with readers about his state of perception in a way that both qualifies and authenticates his report.30 perhaps the most revealing moment is the one in which fear and loathing claims to offer the rendering of an event from thompson’s own notebook, sans edits; the section entitled “breakdown on paradise boulevard” is presented as simply the transcript of the conversation between duke and gonzo. the editor’s note, which heads the section, states: at this point in the chronology, dr. duke appears to have broken down completely; the original manuscript is so splintered that we were forced to seek out the original tape recording and transcribe it verbatim. we made no attempt to edit the section, and dr. duke refused even to read it […] in 3:50 another glass of chivas, dunhill 4:05 first cup of coffee, dunhill 4:15 cocaine 4:16 orange juice, dunhill 4:30 cocaine 4:54 cocaine 5:05 cocaine 28 zavarzadeh, the mythopoeic reality: the postwar american nonfiction novel, 8. 29 thompson, fear and loathing in las vegas: a savage journey into the heart of the american dream, 41. 30 thompson, 37, 41. 35issue vi ◆ spring 2019 phenomenological reproduction the interests of journalistic purity, we are publishing the following section just as it came off the tape.31 in this section, we might say, thompson operates somewhere between zavarzadeh’s testimonial and notational modes, complicating their distinction in his process of searching for avenues to authority. while the testimonial mode, zavarzedeh writes, derives epistemological authority from presence during an event, the notational mode typically does so through the direct, unedited nature of the work, where the author serves only to record the event verbatim for the reader and to reproduce it exactly. thompson intended fear and loathing to toe the line between the two. he sees “the eye & mind of the journalist […] functioning as a camera,” and wants the material to be unedited once recorded, but also recognizes that “the writing would be selective & necessarily interpretive,” since it is filtered through the lens of the author’s experience.32 the above section exemplifies thompson’s operation in this liminal space: it is supposedly a direct recording of the events as they occurred, transcribed from “the original tape recording,” but given that it exists in a work that makes editorial decisions in other sections means, by necessity, that its inclusion is an editorial decision. in this way, thompson operates in both modes simultaneously, notationally including verbatim recordings while testimonially shaping the narrative through decisions that most accurately represent his subjective experience. though thompson writes off this moment by judging the work “a victim of its own conceptual schizophrenia,” he tempers his own dismissal with a coda, claiming it as “a first, gimped effort in a direction that tom wolfe calls ‘the new journalism’ has been flirting with for almost a decade.”33 perhaps most importantly, these moments of narrative discontinuity—from reminders of narrative construction to sudden style changes—execute a sort of brechtian fourth-wall break, bringing readers out of an essentially immersive narrative and forcing them to evaluate their active participation in a more distanced, critical way. through this, such readers are inoculated against taking the work as representative of the world, but rather shown that it is a world in a multitude of worlds. in eason’s formulation, thompson invites the reader to engage in a “multi-layered interrogation of communication […] between the writer and the reader, as a way of constructing reality.”34 readers are empowered to reconstitute their own understanding of the reality presented to them—given the ostensibly unqualified facts of the experience and its conveyance—and thereby accept or reject its truth. norman mailer was as, if not more, aware than thompson of the image-world, and has worked to complicate, engage, and interrogate traditional modes of representation. the first page of armies of the night opens with a selection from time portraying 31 ibid., 120. 32 ibid., 120. 33 thompson, hunter s. the great shark hunt: strange tales from a strange time. (picador, 2012), 123, 122. 34 eason, “the new journalism and the image-world: two modes of organizing experience,” 52. 36 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college him as an uncontrolled drunk, “slurping liquor from a coffee mug” and expounding upon the lack of bathroom facilities in the theater where he is speaking.35 but just as for thompson, mailer’s constructed image is part contrivance in the moment (a construct next to the liberal but respectable robert lowell) and partly the result of a retrospective literary self-fashioning, as john hollowell sees it, into “a kind of psychic president, a moral leader” for the contemporary cultural moment.36 he is “semi-distinguished and semi-notorious,” “the modern everyday fellow,” and “the wild man.”37 by crafting a complex, dipolar, and at times paradoxical self-caricature, he can implicitly criticize the media processes that would claim singular objective construction of his image while only selectively including observations from the event. in armies of the night, mailer operates in two distinct modes: novelist and historian. as novelist, mailer performs two roles. first, the novelist documents reality as it happened to him; he is, in mailer’s words, the “narrative vehicle for the march on the pentagon.”38 however, this experiential record is not entirely forthright or trustworthy. of course, it includes retrospective revisions, as memory, especially since one apparently so often drunk as mailer cannot be trusted to be entirely faithful to original perception. this leads to the second role of the novelist, which is to construct as truthful an image of mailer as possible, by which the reader can correct the effects of his biases on the narrative. in this way, the image of the novelist is a tool, an “instrument to view our facts and conceivably study them in that field of light” that his construction of mailer has produced.39 having established this critical lens, as historian, mailer seeks to accurately “elucidate the mysterious character of that quintessentially american event,” the march on the pentagon.40 in this way, armies of the night serves both as an implicit treatise on behalf of the new journalism and as an explicit criticism of the old, demonstrating mailer’s belief that reporting “intensity and wholeness of perceptions more closely approaches the truth, or the most important truth, of the thing perceived than objective reporting.”41 by choosing an event whose literal occurrence maps onto his view of the vietnam war, mailer creates, as john hollowell describes it in his fact and fiction, an “impressionistic history as seen through the lens of participant-observer.”42 mailer presents the two sides of the literal-figurative war through a series of representative images, relying on connotative understandings to bolster his depictions: “healthy marines, state troopers, professional athletes, movie stars, rednecks, sensuous life35 mailer, norman. the armies of the night: history as a novel, the novel as history. (plume, 2017), 3. 36 hollowell, fact & fiction: the new journalism and the nonfiction novel, 39. 37 mailer, the armies of the night: history as a novel, the novel as history, 13, 15. 38 ibid., 54. 39 ibid., 216. 40 ibid. 41 begiebing, robert j. acts of regeneration: allegory and archetype in the works of norman mailer. (university of missouri press, 1980), 135. 42 hollowell, fact & fiction: the new journalism and the nonfiction novel, 90. 37issue vi ◆ spring 2019 phenomenological reproduction loving mafia, cops [etc.] arrayed against…the freud-ridden embers of marxism, good old american anxiety strata—the urban middle class with their proliferated monumental adenoidal resentments.”43 rather than maintaining a strict focus on the events that he is reporting on, mailer often chooses instead to move into exegetical commentary. in this way, like thompson, he complicates zavarzadeh’s categories of ‘nonfiction novel,’ using them as shifting modes of representation. though mailer seems to operate in the testimonial mode, absorbing and regurgitating events as “witness-participant-narrator,” just so often, he shifts to “a private interpretive scheme to reorder the seemingly random incidents into […] ‘a significant form.’” this is more in line with zavarzadeh’s exegetical mode44, as, for instance, when mailer moves from a debate with lowell and macdonald about the relative merits of being arrested, to an encompassing diatribe on the history of ideological changes of the left over the course of a paragraph.45 in the testimonial mode, he operates as novelist: a vehicle for experience. in the exegetical mode, he is historian, providing interpretive commentary tempered by the reader’s use of his constructed image. diversions characterize mailer’s work; he is even willing to concede the inaccuracy of his perceptions, recording his experience with inconsistencies included. at the height of the march’s frenzy, for example, mailer notes that despite the literal erroneousness of his perception, he experienced a “superimposition of vision,” seeing real men fleeing and carrying an n.l.f. flag chased by phantom mp’s and policemen.46 though he experienced that vision, he also acknowledges that his perception ran contrary to what other participants reported. in this way, he implicitly acknowledges eason’s premise that phenomenological works are a representation of a world among worlds, each bearing the weight of epistemological authority over itself, but no other.47 perhaps the most distinctive element of mailer’s craft is the voice through which he expresses his ideas. in armies, he creates the feel of a novel by having an unnamed narrator describe the events that occur to mailer (of course, the author) as character. in this way, mailer is able to split his presence and voice, paradoxically laying claim to both omniscience and subjectivity. mailer the writer is omniscient because of his unfettered access to the thoughts and motivations of mailer the character. however, he also simultaneously claims epistemological authority through documentation of his subjective experience of the event. clearly, this technique seems to transcend both eason’s categories as well as zavarzadeh’s. though eason asserts that mailer is operating in the phenomenological mode, third person narration typically creates a voice that mediates experience between recorder and consumer, and thus falls more neatly under the umbrella of ethnographic realism. mailer wants his narrator to be “an eyewitness who is a participant but not a vested partisan,” and indeed often 43 mailer, the armies of the night: history as a novel, the novel as history, 34. 44 zavarzadeh, the mythopoeic reality: the postwar american nonfiction novel, 129, 93. 45 mailer, the armies of the night: history as a novel, the novel as history, 85. 46 ibid., 127. 47 eason, “the new journalism and the image-world: two modes of organizing experience,” 51. 38 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college maintains a strong commitment to unfiltered communication of the experience. in other moments, however, he does interpretive work for his readers, presenting them with a rather clean, uncomplicated understanding of events’ relationship and meaning.48 in this way, mailer actually sits in a more intermediate space between phenomenology and ethnography, as well as between testimony and exegesis, since he is both the active communicator of participatory experience and passive commenter on the significance of events. mailer in fact comments on this tension explicitly, explaining that the central figure of his story must, by necessity, be ambiguous, “to recapture the precise feel of the ambiguity of the event and its monumental disproportions.”49 a telling example of mailer’s complication of traditional media’s objectivity in armies is his account of the evening at the ambassador theater. whereas time portrays mailer “stumbling” about the auditorium, incoherently spewing a “scatological solo,” the novel delves into mailer’s reactions to his audience, and the power struggles between the authors on the stage, which would have been invisible to anyone not participating in them. by placing his retrospective account in conversation with time, a proxy for supposedly trustworthy news coverage, mailer positions himself as the epistemological authority on this event. from the opening pages of the work, mailer is playing with twin conceptions of “time,” both in its manifestation as representative of traditional news media as a whole, and in its distorting effects of retrospection on storytelling. the novel is framed as an attempt to supersede both of these impediments to understanding, working to “leave time in order to find out what happened.”50 with his intimate knowledge of what occurred, and, more importantly, his very dispensing with a claim to objectivity, he invites readers to place their trust in the authority of his experience, placing (as mailer writes) “adjectives” and especially “adverbs” (that is, qualifications of perception) beyond the authority of traditional reporting.51 collaterally, he is then well-positioned to expound his own views. unlike thompson, for whom creation of image is not the stated aim, but a byproduct of his writing, mailer presents himself as setting out with the explicit intention of recreating himself in the image-world in the first half of the work, so as to provide the reader with a metric against which they can measure his report in the second half. through what he alerts readers to—“our intimacy with the master builder” of the narrative itself—the reader can account for whatever limits they perceive in mailer’s own ability to report accurately.52 during the early stages of the march, for example, lowell and mailer arrive to the sound of music, which the author initially notes “was being played by the fugs,” but which mailer quickly qualifies (being “scrupulously phenomenological”). 48 mailer, the armies of the night: history as a novel, the novel as history, 53. 49 ibid., 53. 50 ibid., 4. 51 ibid., 282. 52 ibid., 218. 39issue vi ◆ spring 2019 phenomenological reproduction as per usual, mailer places himself in the third person: “mailer heard the music first, then noticed the musicians and their costumes, then recognized […] it was the fugs.”53 by comically highlighting the issue of phenomenology, mailer demonstrates an awareness of the audience’s concerns, and preempts their questions before they even have them. thompson and mailer thus adopt somewhat divergent strategies. by grounding himself in the first-person, thompson plays on the epistemological authority of experience to give weight to his account; he then crafts his argument through the symbolic representations that largely appear through hallucination. mailer, on the other hand, constructs his argument through a multifaceted approach to documentation, which addresses the weaknesses of both subjective and objective reporting so as to craft the truest retelling possible. “the history as novel” contains both the strengths and weaknesses of subjectivity, strong in its documentation of the “history of himself ”—the story of an individual experience—and yet, it is weak in its necessarily limited scope.54 “the novel as history” is in turn the embodiment of objectivity, with strength in its far-reaching account of events, and weakness in its necessarily biased universalization. as begeibing comments in his acts of regeneration, mailer responds to traditional objective journalism by “fusing the personal truths of the experience with the events themselves” and sits with the understanding that “neither kind of truth is exclusive to either book.”55 by operating in both modes, mailer is able to account for the flaws of both the novelist and the historian, using the strengths of each to balance out the weaknesses of the other. the central event in armies of the night, the march on the pentagon, exemplifies mailer’s skill at hewing metaphorical meaning from literal events. he considers the purpose of the march itself “to wound [the pentagon] symbolically,” extending the ideas that he had developed as far back as “the white negro.”56 in that essay, he suggested that hipsters, who (as he saw it) in armies make up the shock troops of the march, seek to live not within the world, but outside of it, in a life and reality of their own creation. they interact with the world through energy and vibrations, where every interaction ends in either an increase or decrease in the energy that one possesses, and thus one’s ability to perceive the world. mailer sketches the mindset of the marchers in the same terms, as they seek not military victory, but instead “new kinds of victories [that] increase one’s power for new kinds of perception.”57 through this language of perception and energy, mailer is able to construct a retelling of the event, which operates simultaneously on the literal and figurative level. he re-forms the march into symbolic civil war while simultaneously portraying the reality of what occurred. 53 ibid., 119. 54 ibid., 215. 55 begeibing, acts of regeneration: allegory and archetype in the works of norman mailer, 141. 56 mailer, norman. advertisements for myself. (penguin books, 2018), 54 57 mailer, 76. 40 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college upon arrival at this climactic scene, the first detail that mailer notes is the chaotic mix of cymbals, chanting, and spoken word played by the fugs. throughout the beginning of the pentagon episode, much of mailer’s attention is focused on the fugs’ role in the yuppie army’s attempt to raise the pentagon “three hundred feet,” where it would then “turn orange and vibrate until all evil emissions had fled this levitation.”58 through his description of their production, mailer implicitly draws a parallel between the intention of the fugs’s artistic performance and his own: the exorcism would proceed, and the fugs were to serve as a theatrical medium…while the indian triangle and the cymbal sounded, while a trumpet offered a mournful subterranean wail, full of sobs, and mahogany shadows of sorrow, and all sour groans from hell’s dungeon, while finger bells tinkled and drums beat, so did [ed sanders, lead vocalist of the fugs’] solemn voice speak something approximate to this.59 mailer then goes on to describe sanders’ extended meditation on the evils of the war in vietnam. here, in their role as “theatrical medium” the fugs act as both representative of, and conduit for, experience, as their music simultaneously reflects and feeds the energy of the crowd. meanwhile, mailer does the same, recording the event while he participates in it, chanting along with the crowd. he describes a paper passed around in the terms of mutual co-construction of experience: “by the act of reading this paper, you are engaged in the holy exorcism,” a collective understanding of what the event is and yet also how a common vision means to transform it.60 at the same time, the phenomenological information that mailer conveys is permeated by a tone that matches the strangely serious and absurd approach of the protest itself. while the fugs chant about the pentagon’s first grope-in for peace, for instance, mailer finds himself musing about how his “three divorces and four wives” have forced him to concede “the absolute existence of witches.”61 though the protest of the pentagon is deeply serious—addressing, after all, the horrors of war in general and the vietnam war in particular—neither mailer nor his yippie shock troops can seem to broach the subject without a bent towards the ridiculous, or even the irreverent. thus, by jumping back and forth between documentary and experiential modes, from straining “to see what was going on at the head of the column,” over to the fugs playing “out, demons, out!” to the people “streaming […] to see what the attack had developed,” mailer mimics the head-turning hysteria of the march.62 yet, as mailer’s participation in the event comes to its conclusion, his narration snaps back into the novelist’s sharp focus on minute detail and reader-absorption. after 58 mailer, the armies of the night: history as a novel, the novel as history, 120. 59 ibid., 120-121. 60 ibid., 121. 61 ibid., 122, 123. 62 ibid., 126. 41issue vi ◆ spring 2019 phenomenological reproduction stepping past the rope meant to separate the marchers from the pentagon, what occurs next is illustrated in stark relief, and in a coherent, logical order: the mp’s stood in two widely spaced ranks. the first rank was ten yards behind the rope, and each mp in that row was close to twenty feet from the next man. the second rank, similarly spaced, was ten yards behind the first rank and perhaps thirty yards behind them a cluster appeared, every fifty yards or so, of two or three u. s. marshals in white helmets and dark blue suits…he made a point of stepping neatly and decisively over the low rope. then he headed across the grass to the nearest mp he saw. it was as if the air had changed, or the light had altered; he felt immediately much more alive—yes, bathed in air—and yet disembodied from himself, as if indeed he were watching himself in a film where this action was taking place. he could feel the eyes of the people behind the rope watching him, could feel the intensity of their existence as spectators.63 mailer takes time to describe the smallest details, from his augmented perception of the light, to his feeling of being watched, to the “naked stricken lucidity” of the military police as he strides towards them.64 he also returns to an extended meditation, making attempts at recreating the interiority of the mp in front of him, wondering whether he quivered from a “desire to strike [mailer], or secret military wonder […] now possessed of a moral force which implanted terror in the arms of young soldiers.”65 throughout this sequence, he refers back to the air quality, calling it “mountain air,” though washington sits firmly near sea level. he ceases referring to it as such only when he is finally brought away from the crowd and is placed out of view.66 in doing so, mailer sets apart those moments at which his image is being created—when he is on display—not only for the people present, but also for those who will watch the bbc footage later on. mailer writes of having felt—in a variation on thompson’s claim, quoted earlier—at once “more alive […] and yet disembodied from himself, as if indeed he were watching himself in a film where this action was taking place.”67 mailer paints himself as aware, in the moment of experience, of the simultaneity of the real and the image. he feels that his actions were being recorded, whether on video or in memory, shaping his conception in the public consciousness. though eason’s separation of ethnographic realism and cultural phenomenology offers a critically important approach to new journalism, thompson and mailer both illustrate that the distinction is not as dichotomous as eason might suggest. for thompson, representation of reality is not consistently an active, co-constructive act in conjunction for the reader, as eason’s categorization of thompson as cultural phenomenologist might suggest. though thompson often qualifies the faithfulness 63 ibid., 129-130. 64 ibid., 130. 65 ibid. 66 ibid., 130, 138. 67 ibid., 129. (emphasis mine) 42 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college of his account in “breakdown on paradise boulevard,” he presents the report to the reader as patently representative of what occurred, taken “verbatim” for the sake of “journalistic purity.”68 this sort of ostensible straightforwardness strays toward the realm of ethnographic realism in that it assumes a shared perception with the reader, namely that verbatim recordings are a “purer” representation of reality than memory or perceptual experience. however, the section also has elements of cultural phenomenology: it cedes the fragmentary nature of reality (indeed, the manuscript is “splintered,” acknowledging the inability to communicate that perceptual experience). these sorts of paradoxical, intermediate moments expose the weaknesses of eason’s categories. though they are at times not as strictly separate as one might wish, they still prove useful in the framework that they provide to describe the reciprocal interaction of the image-world and reality in these pieces, and how thompson and mailer’s understanding of that relationship shapes their reconstruction of self. in spite of the fact that the world appears irreparably fractured, into brutish factions that populate washington and las vegas, mailer and thompson both use the imageworld as a tool to construct a more stable, cohesive self. the march, for mailer, is an almost incommunicably chaotic event; however, by placing himself at the center of it in his retelling, he builds an image of norman mailer which, though at times confusing and complex, is nonetheless solid. this reconstitution of the self comes as a result of the interplay of reality, in his actions, and the image-world, in his book and other representations. by this self-reflexive recreation, he puts forth an addendum to eason’s categories, whereby the journalist is able both to penetrate the image to reveal the reality (for example in his rebuttal of the time depiction) and to understand the implication and mutualistic relationship of the image on reality, and vice versa. through these complications, we see how each journalist simultaneously supports and undermines eason’s distinctions. by bringing each category into question, and the two into conversation with one another, we can then most fully explore these modes of representation. ◆ 68 thompson, fear and loathing in las vegas: a savage journey into the heart of the american dream, 161. 43issue vi ◆ spring 2019 phenomenological reproduction bibliography begiebing, robert j. acts of regeneration: allegory and archetype in the works of norman mailer. columbia: university of missouri press, 1980. eason, david l. “the new journalism and the image-world: two modes of organizing experience.” in critical studies in mass communication, 1984. hollowell, john. fact & fiction: the new journalism and the nonfiction novel. chapel hill: university of north carolina press, 1977. mailer, norman. the armies of the night: history as a novel, the novel as history. plume, 2017. mailer, norman. advertisements for myself. london: penguin books, 2018. thompson, hunter s. fear and loathing in las vegas: a savage journey into the heart of the american dream. new york: random house, 1998. thompson, hunter s. the great shark hunt: strange tales from a strange time. london: picador, 2012. zavarzadeh, mas'ud. the mythopoeic reality: the postwar american nonfiction novel. champaign: university of illinois press, 1976. 102 c o n t r ib u t o r s bernardo portilho andrade middlebury college ‘18 bernardo andrade is a junior philosophy major at middlebury college, in vermont. born in rio de janeiro, brazil, he studied philosophy for six years in both middle and high schools, and then spent a semester at the federal university of rio de janeiro before beginning collegiate studies in the united states. his interests lie in philosophy of religion and continental thought, focusing in particular on the phenomenological tradition and the figure of emmanuel levinas. he has a love for russian language and literature, and especially for the works of dostoevsky, whom he hopes to read in the original russian. after college, he plans to pursue a ph.d. in philosophy. clare chiodini boston university ‘18 clare chiodini was born in cambridge, massachusetts and grew up close by in woburn. she is currently a junior at boston university, double majoring in philosophy and ancient greek & latin. although she usually prefers to immerse herself in philosophical dialogue with ancient greek philosophers, she has developed a special interest in the philosophy of martin heidegger through the captivating instruction of her professor, daniel o. dahlstrom. in the precious little free time she has, she enjoys photography, drawing, reading and watching anime. she does not enjoy going to the gym, but she occasionally does anyway. robert engelman boston university ‘17 robert engelman is a senior at boston university where he is completing a double major in philosophy and psychology. his main philosophical areas of interest include the philosophy of art, philosophical anthropology, ethics, and 19th-20th century philosophy (especially nietzsche and wittgenstein). he spend most of his time reading, writing, listening to music, making music, and – during breaks from school – backpacking. martin joseph fitzgerald worcester polytechnic institute ‘17 marty fitzgerald is a senior at worcester polytechnic institute where he is completing a dual major in chemical engineering and philosophy with a minor in materials science. he is particularly interested in philosophy of art, with an emphasis on art as an investigative method as well as on the relation of art to metaphysics. outside of academics, marty enjoys backpacking, computer programming, chess, gin rummy, and good conversation over coffee. 103issue iv f spring 2017 kelly janakiefski university of notre dame ‘17 kelly janakiefski is a senior at the university of notre dame who is on the verge of completing a double major in finance and philosophy. after graduation, she will go on to work for johnson & johnson in the finance leadership development program, but in the meantime, she’s asking the important questions like “what is the nature of god?” and “how can i convince my friends that philosophy is a real major?” she loves philosophical puzzles of all kinds, but she keeps coming back to st. thomas aquinas, whose philosophy is truly (in the words of g.k. chesterton) “a cosmos of common sense; terra vientium; a land of the living.” mghanga david mwakima harvard college ’17 david mwakima is a senior in harvard college from nairobi, kenya majoring in philosophy with a minor in mathematical sciences. his recent interests in philosophy have been in the history of philosophy, specifically early modern history of philosophy and the philosophy of mind or perception. for his senior thesis, he is writing on berkeley’s argument for immaterialism in a treatise concerning the principles of human knowledge. he is also interested in the philosophy of mathematics, especially the philosophy of geometry and its relationship to epistemology, philosophy of science, and the foundations of physics. outside of philosophy, his favorite hobby is music and he plays the soprano saxophone. fisher pressman boston college ‘17 fisher pressman is a senior finance and philosophy double major at boston college. fisher’s philosophical areas of interest include mid-century french phenomenology and existentialism, with a strong concentration on the works of maurice merleauponty and jean-paul sartre. he also has an interest in semiotics and structuralism, focusing on the works of roland barthes. otherwise, fisher spends his time captaining the academic debate team, and working with the dean of students with his post on the student conduct board. he has also worked as a research assistant in the finance department, with research in hedge fund activity and the tenure of senior management at public companies. outside of school, fisher enjoys recreational sailing and playing squash. after graduation, fisher will move to new york city to work on wall street. 6 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college δι ά νο ια an interview with gregory fried, ph.d., professor of philosophy at boston college towards a polemical ethics: between heidegger and plato "i think for plato and for socrates, the philosophical life is a constant striving to seek that enlightenment: to try our utmost to transcend our historical circumstances, even knowing that we will ultimately fail." patrick kelly, managing editor !ank you, professor fried, for agreeing to have this interview with us. professor gregory fried !ank you so much. i look forward to our chat. pk so can you give us a brief introduction on the relevance of your book toward a polemical ethic, why you chose to write it, how you think it might prove useful for today’s philosophy students as well as for non-philosophers, and why you chose to focus on this area? gf !ank you for that question. it’s always a di"cult question to ask a philosopher, but i think it’s the responsibility of a philosopher to try to answer the question, who is their audience, and what are they trying to achieve? many academic philosophy books—in fact, i would imagine the vast majority of them—are written for a specialized academic audience. while i think philosophers are very happy when people outside academic life—or outside of philosophy as a speci#c discipline—read them, it’s not common and it is not the audience most professional philosophers 7issue x ◆ spring 2023 an interview with gregory fried, ph.d., professor of philosophy at boston college write for. however, i tried to write this book for a more general audience than just heidegger specialists or philosophy specialists. !at is very di"cult to do when working on a #gure like heidegger. but i believe there is something relevant to a wider audience here. i think the fundamental issue that is at stake is heidegger’s claim that the challenges facing european civilization, which has e$ectively become a global civilization after colonialism, and the integration of the world into a single world economy—that those challenges are addressed by heidegger as going all the way back to a tradition rooted in greek thought and in plato. heidegger is challenging plato and challenging that tradition. very unfortunately, heidegger’s own personal response to those challenges was to say that this tradition needs to come to an end; that it has exhausted itself; that what we think of as contemporary, enlightened liberal societies—those are manifestations, not of the strength of our civilization, but of its decline and its weakness. heidegger traces that weakness back to greek thinking, starting with plato, which sees the world as divided between historical reality—the shadows of the cave that we live in—and the realm of philosophical truth, the realm of the ideas, which philosophy can bring us to as the true world beyond our historical experience in which there are everlasting truths that transcend us. heidegger thought that way of thinking about what it means to be human in the world was responsible for uprooting humanity from its connection to the reality of its historical world. i disagree with him about that. i think there’s a way of reading plato, which shows that plato takes into account the concerns that heidegger has and that he has an answer for heidegger. obviously, plato comes more than 2000 years before heidegger, so he’s not answering him personally. but i see it as my task in the book to think with plato against heidegger, but also to think with heidegger, to take seriously what his challenges to us are. !at brings me to the present because i do believe that, especially in the united states, we are facing a political, social, and cultural crisis over the meaning of our own national political identity, and that this has something to do not with plato and heidegger directly, but the issues these two philosophers bring up for us— issues that can be traced to the kinds of thinking that do exist in our own historical tradition and that are familiar to americans. my book’s last chapter is about frederick douglass as an american thinker and political actor who embodies for me the response that i actually think is a platonic or socratic one to the challenges of contemporary american democracy. i do hope that i have a wider audience that can understand the broad relevance of philosophy in the 8 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college western tradition for the crises that we face in the united states and elsewhere in the world that revolve around the human beings that we want to be in the 21st century. pk what is your own approach to writing? socrates, as you mention in your book’s address to the reader, never published a single word. so, what is your method in approaching writing and stepping into, as you just said, the space where conversation with heidegger and plato is possible? gf i think i say at the very beginning of the book that i’m a platonist and a socratic. and for me, thinking is dialogical. i think in conversations. i think in conversations with philosophical thinkers, but also with colleagues and with friends. it’s very hard for me to write from a standing start, as it were. so sometimes i feel that conversation very directly, and it allows me to write quickly and well. sometimes i have to really examine myself to see what the conversation is that i want to take up in order to get my dialogical energies %owing. so, in fact, when i started this book, i began writing it as a letter to one of my close colleagues and friends, because that was the way for me to imagine my way into a philosophical dialogue about what matters in this project. i try to engage in that dialogue with heidegger, against heidegger, with plato, and even against certain aspects of plato. i think that’s the best general explanation of how i go about writing. i do have an outline. i have a plan for what i want to do, but i don’t write according to a #xed outline of what’s de#nitely going to happen in my book. it’s more of an outline around broad issues, even questions that i want to address, because my thinking happens in my writing. !e writing is a dialogue for me, so i’m not entirely sure what’s going to happen or where it will go. i’m telling a story about thinking when i’m writing. pk on that note: in your #rst chapter, you describe philosophy as a form of absolute freedom. do you feel that way yourself when you’re entering into these dialogues, when you’re writing? or put it this way: would you care to elaborate on what it means for you, in the con#nes of the discussion between heidegger and plato, to experience philosophy as a form of absolute freedom? gf first, abstractly, i think philosophy is absolute freedom because philosophy asks us to take seriously the challenge of separating ourselves from our most immediate convictions and attachments and prejudices in order to think through a question or a problem with fresh eyes. it’s very hard to do that. i don’t think human beings can ever fully do that. but i do think there is an ethical obligation on us if we’re going to think of ourselves as engaging in philosophy to take seriously the challenge of being that free. i do think that the experience of that freedom can be terrifying sometimes because, as human beings, we are attached to our convictions, our opinions. !ey attach us not only to our sense of ourselves, but to other people as well. and so seriously questioning one’s own deepest convictions can be very disorienting; it can even give a sense of danger that one may be risking relationships with people one 9issue x ◆ spring 2023 an interview with gregory fried, ph.d., professor of philosophy at boston college cares about if one ends up with a di$erent view than one had before one started philosophizing, especially about ethical and political issues. but i also think that this sense of liberation from one’s own context can be exhilarating. i don’t think we can ever completely leave our own context, and that’s part of my argument in the book. we’re always returning to where we began and trying to see it with fresh eyes. i think there is a way to reconcile our embeddedness in a context and in a world which matters to us, in which we have opinions and convictions that matter to us a great deal. it’s possible to look at those with the ideal of freedom and consider them and then return to them in ways that can rejuvenate them. if there are aspects that we really discern, we need to reject about our prior convictions and prejudices, that should be liberating and not depressing. pk regarding freedom: in your chapter titled “freedom under fire,” you discuss heidegger in terms of the cave-analogy. leo strauss has famously said that modernity is the second cave under the cave. in what way does heidegger see our freedom as being under #re, is it similar to strauss’s point? how would plato respond to this argument? gf strauss’ point about modernity having dug a cave, even beneath the cave-%oor of plato’s allegory is really very interesting. i do think that strauss has in mind the predicament that heidegger presents us with. i’ll come back to that. but i think what strauss meant by that was that for the greeks, for plato and plato’s allegory of the cave, they, could really recognize the shadows of everyday experience as a normal aspect of political life, and that that was immediately tangible to them. modernity, on the other hand, conceptualizes and theorizes and historicizes political life so radically that we’ve in fact lost touch with the phenomena of everyday political experience— what it means to be a social animal. for strauss, we have to claw our way back just to the experience of what it means to be situated naively in one’s own historical, political, cultural context because we have mediated that so much with theories that no longer allow us to experience it directly. to come back to heidegger: i titled that chapter “freedom under fire” for two reasons. one is because in the allegory of the cave, we, the prisoners in the cave, 10 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college are literally by the topography of the cave that socratic depicts, under a #re behind and above us, a #re we can’t see as projecting the shadows on the wall of the cave. how can we be free under the #re of the cave, which is what gives us the minimal illumination that we have to see even the shadows by? can there be freedom there? !at’s part of heidegger’s question. what is the freedom of the cave? is there freedom in the cave? how do we become free in the cave? !at’s a question for socrates and plato as well. but this is where heidegger and plato diverge. and because they diverge, that’s the other meaning of freedom under #re. being under #re means you’re under attack. attack by an enemy. i do think that there is an attack that heidegger is making against freedom as it has been understood, at least in the last several hundred years of the liberal enlightenment. !at’s a very broad statement. !e enlightenment was many things, and liberalism was and is many things. but i think that’s still the issue on the table: the nature of freedom and modernity. so, for socrates in telling the story of the cave, freedom only happens when we’re released from the chains. but it’s not just the release from the chains that really makes us free because we’re enormously disoriented once we lose those chains. we can’t make out the shadows in the dark anymore. we’re blinded by the light of the #re. we need a new orientation, and we need to climb out of the cave to see what the ultimate reality truly is. i think for heidegger, there is no ultimate climbing out of the cave. why? because heidegger rejects the platonic distinction between the eternal world of the ideas that are accessible to us through philosophy and the historical world of our opinions, our embeddedness in a particular culture and society that for the most part dominates us, but a world that we can transcend philosophically. heidegger rejects that. he does not believe that there is a realm beyond history that we can achieve. his interpretation of the cave is not to free ourselves from our historical boundedness to a particular time and place, but instead to free ourselves from the average everyday lazy interpretation that we have of our historical situatedness, where we don’t confront it, where we don’t assess it for ourselves, where we don’t make it our own. his understanding of liberation from the cave is as a way of being more authentically situated in the cave itself. i think for somebody like strauss—and i would agree with him on this—heidegger e$ectively walls o$ the exit to the cave and leaves us there in our historical time, our historical place, without the possibility of true transcendence to something, some objective standard, that’s beyond time and beyond history that we can use to evaluate our historical situation. so for heidegger, the freedom within the cave is just to know and to authentically live within it and situate oneself inside it without using an external standard—whether eternal or natural—to justify it with. for heidegger, nature means something very speci#c. so, he would agree that there can be a natural standard, but not in the sense that nature has been used in the liberal enlightenment by natural rights theories, where nature becomes something universal 11issue x ◆ spring 2023 an interview with gregory fried, ph.d., professor of philosophy at boston college that we can philosophize about and can apply to all human beings, where we all have natural rights or what in contemporary times we call human rights that transcend history and time and place. for enlightenment, liberal thinking, again, speaking with a broad brush, if we have a natural right, then that right applies irrespective of culture, time, and place, even if people don’t recognize it as such. heidegger is rejecting that. what does that mean? it means, yes, that the freedom we have is freedom to own up to the #nite speci#city of our worldly existence. what’s natural about that is not something that unites all of humanity across time. nature, for heidegger, is about genuinely experiencing what history means for you in your time and your place and the tasks that your history presents you with in your time and place, and voluntarily taking those upon your shoulders rather than just being borne along by the current of what everyone else is doing; but there’s no eternal external standard by which to judge the choices you make in that freedom. now, i think that’s a very powerful argument. pk yes, i’m simultaneously compelled and repulsed by it. gf yeah, people do #nd it very attractive, and yet there is some profound danger to it. pk well, i’m just thinking of heidegger’s own history. on the one hand, there seems to be a certain impossibility about what plato is calling for. but on the other, without it, you can situate yourself in such a way that naziism becomes not only appealing but acceptable. gf !at is, in my view, the danger of this position, because it makes one’s own historical situatedness an ultimate barrier to identi#cation with all of humanity. !at ends up leading into nationalism—if not worse. because one’s most important commitments are historically bound, and there’s no way for a very di$erent culture with a very di$erent history to share that, one can respect that other cultures, other nations, other peoples have their own histories and their own historical tasks to take up authentically. and what you don’t want to do for heidegger is fuse them all together into some mishmash where everyone then loses the singularity of their own historical traditions. but heidegger is not merely some traditionalist. he’s not calling for a return to the past. he’s calling for taking one’s own past really seriously, though, in terms of what it means for dealing with one’s own present and the future, and to make the past questionable. but it’s questionable in your way as a member of that tradition. and that’s your obligation—to think that through. 12 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college pk i have one more question. in your concluding chapter, you discuss how a reconstructive view of history can help us to embody “polemical” ethics and lead to a new understanding of freedom. so, in the context of the present-day united states, how can a reconstructive view of our history elucidate polemical ethics and help us move forward as a people? what might that look like? gf by “polemical ethics,” i do not mean a combative attitude that’s looking for #ghts, that’s trying to win at all costs. here, i’m trying to think with heidegger and plato against the historically limited way that heidegger thinks about political belonging. i think that heidegger is right in saying that what it means to be human is to be polemical in his larger sense, which means to be confronted with one’s own history and to confront one’s own history and have to interpret it. we are necessarily embedded in the world that we’re born into, and that has to have an impact on us. !ere’s no getting around that. and all of us are confronted by that task in little ways and in big ways in our everyday life and in momentous decisions that we have. we’re informed by the past, we’re carried forward by the past. but if we don’t take seriously for ourselves what that past really means for us going forward into the future, we’re not taking ourselves seriously, and we’re not taking other people seriously. !e polemical ethic is to take oneself, one’s history, and other people in the world around you—what they have to say, what they have to do—with utmost seriousness, and to be challenged by it and to challenge it. my di$erence with heidegger is that i think he’s fundamentally wrong about denying need for transcendence beyond our own historical situatedness. i don’t think—and this is getting very complex, so i can only say a little bit about it, and the readers of this interview will have to read the book—i don’t think that plato or socrates believe that absolute transcendence from our #nite situatedness is truly possible for human beings. i believe they both think we can get glimmers of what that might mean and have experiences of transcending our limited #nite understanding of things and of coming to a new understanding of them. but i think for plato and for socrates, the philosophical life is a constant striving to seek that enlightenment: to try our utmost to transcend our historical circumstances, even knowing that we will ultimately fail. and that’s an ongoing struggle that makes life interesting but is also an ethical and political requirement on us. in our context, i think that we see this animated by the american experiment in liberal democracy, where the american experiment begins with these very high-%ying words: we hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal. !at’s an ideal standard for what you think of as human life—and also what society you think would be a good and decent one, and what government you think would be a legitimate one. did america in 1776, at the time of the declaration of independence, or in 1789, when the constitution was adopted, embody those 13issue x ◆ spring 2023 an interview with gregory fried, ph.d., professor of philosophy at boston college ideals? was reality in conformity with those ideals? absolutely not. !ere was slavery, there was the subjugation of women. even white men didn’t have the vote because there were property requirements for having the vote. so, in what sense are all persons created equal if that’s the world that we are inhabiting? an example of the “polemical” ethic is to confront the historical reality in which one lives and say: we have this ideal, we claim we’re living by this ideal. what does that ideal truly mean? have we misunderstood it? when it says all men, does it mean only all white men, or all white men who own enough property? does it include the people of color who have been enslaved? we had a civil war to try to resolve that question. does all men mean all males, or does it include women? !e confrontation with our history tells us that women should have the vote and have equal rights under the constitution—that working itself out of what the ideal means requires that we transcend our time in order to understand the ideal more fully. if people couldn’t do that, slavery would never have been challenged in the way it was by #gures that i take as heroic and emblematic of this. and the one that i’ve chosen here to speak of is frederick douglass and others. but douglas, in my view, is a paramount version of a modern american platonist who confronts his lived situation and is faithful enough to the ideals of what that situation ought to be, what it should be, to try to rectify and change the lived world so it’s a little bit closer to what that ideal, as best he understands it, requires. i think we’re still #ghting that #ght. !at’s a summation in very broad strokes of what’s going on in my book and why i think these issues are important. pk !ank you for your time, prof. fried. it’s been a pleasure. gregory fried, towards a polemical ethics: between heidegger and plato (lanham: rowman & little#eld, 2022). professor fried’s book can be purchased on amazon or from the publisher at http://www.rowman.com. 88 δι νο ια !"#$%&'(#!%"!"#$%&'(#!%" a former athlete at my local badminton club recently posted an article on medium alleging sexual harassment against one of the coaches at the club. her article included descriptions of her personal experiences with the coach, as well as the !rst-person testimony of other teenage players at the club, who alleged that the coach had given inappropriate massages and made sexually suggestive comments to the teenage badminton players at the club. in the article, the author wrote that she had reported her experiences with the coach to safesport, the governing body that oversees athletes’ safety. unfortunately, safesport had failed to complete an investigation into the coach at the time when the author's complaints were reported; local law enforcement also failed to !nd evidence of a crime. almost immediately after it was posted, reshares of the article erupted on facebook. some female athletes shared the article and added stories of their own experiences with the coach that corroborated the narrative put forth in the medium article. yet others— many of whom were the victims’ classmates and training mates—posted long facebook statuses attesting to the coach’s character and asked readers to give the coach the “bene!t of the doubt”. "e overarching thrust of their argument was that judgment should be withheld until the coach had a chance to publish a statement in defense of his actions. both views present compelling arguments that have been defended at length in philosophical literature about the rights of sexual assault survivors and the rights of the accused, respectively. the justification)application spectrum: exploring seyla benhabib’s reconciliation of the generalized and concrete others megan wu 89issue viii � spring 2021 the justification-application spectrum to be a feminist and a supporter of the #metoo movement requires that survivors of assault and their personal narratives be taken seriously. yet, one might still wonder how it can be just to deny the accused a chance to defend their action. contemporary problems, like the treatment of sexual assault in the media and popular culture, are as discursive as they are social because they raise questions about what perspectives are most important in a dialogue about each incident, and what form our public conversations about events ought to take. in particular, the responses to the article present an important tension between competing values: personal experiences, which come already grounded in a framework of identity and power central to subject positioning, and universal and purportedly identityindependent principles that govern justice in societies. to navigate the relationship between both of these values, i turn to seyla benhabib’s work on discourse ethics. re!ning our discourse, she argues, is the best way to mediate and balance abstract principles of justice with attention to non-abstract experiences, emotions, and identities. 1 benhabib’s communicative ethicsbenhabib’s communicative ethics seyla benhabib, in her exploration of the embodied self, writes of two di#erent conceptions of identity: the generalized other and the concrete other.2 for benhabib, the study of subjectivity is an important consideration for the study of ethics because philosophers like kant and rawls have historically derived normative claims from their descriptive assumptions about the subject.3 in this tradition, universalist philosophers assume the standpoint of the generalized other; that is, subjects are constituted by rationality and should be subject to the same formal laws of reciprocity and equality that we would ask of ourselves.4 disparities like those that race and gender can only be remedied by a system of norms that require one to abstract from their personal identities so that they can objectively consider the interests of others and society as a whole. however, in opposition to the universalist tradition, moral psychologists like carol gilligan have identi!ed the necessity of adopting the standpoint of the concrete other; a subject for which individual history, identity, and desires are important.5 as benhabib puts it—in the context of the concrete other—one views subjects in terms of their “concrete history, identity, and a#ective-emotional constitution […] we abstract from what constitutes our commonality.”6 "e female badminton players referenced in the introduction spoke from concrete standpoints, which can be corroborated through their use of personal narratives, emotions, and their discussion of power imbalances in their experiences with the coach. "ose in defense of the coach took a generalized standpoint wherein they drew on abstract, rawlsian principles of justice like the rights of the accused and of formal legal inquiry. "ough it may be compelling to think of the generalized and concrete others as diametrically opposed conceptions of subjectivity, 1 seyla benhabib, ""e generalized and the concrete other: "e kohlberg-gilligan controversy and feminist "eory." praxis international, no. 4 (1985): 416. 2 benhabib, !e generalized and !e concrete other, 415. 3 benhabib, !e generalized and !e concrete other, 408-409. 4 benhabib, !e generalized and !e concrete other, 414. 5 carol gilligan, in a di"erent voice: psychological !eory and women’s development. (cambridge, ma: harvard university press, 1936), 100-101. 6 benhabib, !e generalized and !e concrete other, 411. 90 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college benhabib’s argument is that reconciling the two is necessary for any moral theory; both conceptions of the self are important in di#erent scenarios. as a way of reconciling or navigating an interplay between the generalized and concrete others, benhabib proposes the idea of communicative ethics, which consists of the following four principles:7 1. "at participants in the dialogue inquire about what others would want if they were the a#ected party. 2. "at there exist no epistemic constraints within the dialogue; in other words, factors related to either universal principles, or to particularized, historically contingent principles, ought to be recognized as important in good dialogues, and ought to thereby give merit to both the generalized and concrete others. 3. "at there be no restrictions on the moral domain, which is to say, that all choices merit ethical consideration by virtue of the fact that one of them could involve either value judgments from, or interactions with, others. 4. "at the “rules,” practices, and guidelines of the dialogue are subject to change. benhabib defends the communicative ethics from critics in her work, “in defense of universalism: yet again!”, by clarifying that the act of deliberation itself su$ciently solves the problems that critics believe would arise in her discursive framework.8 benhabib’s thesis, which i will elaborate and expand on in the next section, is that when misrecognition of the concrete other occurs, having a conversation about it and correcting the misunderstanding is a prerequisite to resolving disagreements, both factual and moral. a communicative ethics is therefore an innately self-correcting system. answering asymmetrical reciprocityanswering asymmetrical reciprocity iris marion young responds to benhabib’s “"e generalized and "e concrete other” in “asymmetrical reciprocity: on moral respect, wonder, and elongated "ought,” wherein she argues that the process of universalizing, or imagining what another agent would want, goes awry when agents substitute their perception of another agent’s desires over what those desires actually are.9 in some cases, substitution may be a well-intentioned misunderstanding, such as a person mistakenly buying a gift that is already owned by the recipient. other cases of substitution, like paternalistic substitution, are far more concerning; this would be akin to going on a service trip to an underdeveloped country without actually helping the country’s residents, but still bene!ting from the appearance of humanitarianism and charitability. "is thereby shows how models based on reciprocity can become problematic when they 7 benhabib, !e generalized and !e concrete other, 417. 8 seyla benhabib, "in defense of universalism. yet again! a response to critics of situating the self." new german critique, no. 62 (1994): 176. doi:10.2307/488515 9 iris marion young, “feminism and the public sphere: asymmetrical reciprocity: on moral respect, wonder, and enlarged "ought.” constellations 3, no. 3 (1997): 354. 91issue viii � spring 2021 the justification-application spectrum occur across imbalances of power. young argues that paternalistic substitution causes agents to either impose or to assume their notion of what others want over and against the actual experiences, desires, and perspectives of the other, which precludes the communicative ethics from striking a balance between honoring the perspectives of marginalized individuals in dialogues and maintaining generalized principles like reciprocity and fairness. to resolve this issue, young advocates for “asymmetrical reciprocity,”10 which argues that understanding and recognizing the other is necessary for reciprocity to work correctly. an asymmetrical understanding of reciprocity considers both the history of power dynamics present in the relationship, and the participants’ unique positions along the intersections of di#erent identities like race and gender.11 functionally, asymmetrical reciprocity requires prioritizing the concrete other over the generalized other because recognizing the asymmetries of a relationship involves giving an account of the relationship in terms of the concreteness of the participants (rather than generalized ways in which the participants may interact). i argue, however, that evaluating the standpoint of the concrete other prior to that of the generalized other is made functionally impossible given the complexities of di#erent intersections between identity categories. i additionally defend benhabib’s communicative ethics by arguing that their adherence alone is su$cient to resolve the de!ciencies of young’s asymmetrical reciprocity. "e !rst de!ciency of asymmetrical reciprocity is that it cannot account for the interpersonal relationships between members of a marginalized group, and between members of a marginalized group and another group (whether marginal or otherwise). attempting to describe the relationship in terms of an “asymmetry” ultimately fails because the particularities of identity cannot always easily translate into a simple, scalar comparison of privilege. one such example is that of colorist prejudice: many in the east asian community are prejudiced against dark-skinned asians for a number of reasons including darker skin being associated with low-class labor, black skin, and opposition to eurocentric beauty standards.12 however, though an asymmetry between lightand darkskinned east asians certainly exists, the size of the asymmetry is too di$cult to quantify since its degree occurs on a sliding scale according to the individual color of one’s skin, rather than on a binary opposition between being or not being a member of a given racial group. intersectionality, too, poses a problem for asymmetrical reciprocity: each person has a number of characteristics (e.g. economic class, gender, level of education, etc.) that make it di$cult to clearly tell which participants are the most disadvantaged relative to others in real, asymmetrical relationships. ultimately, i contend that a communicative ethics is perhaps the best framework for apprehending the asymmetries posed by di#erences in identity: even if recognizing one’s structural privilege relative to others’ is impossible to know, the !rst principle of communicative ethics is that participants attempt to view problems from 10 young, asymmetrical reciprocity, 343. 11 young, asymmetrical reciprocity, 347. 12 trina jones, “"e signi!cance of skin color in asian and asian-american communities: initial re%ections.” uc irvine law review, university of california press 3 (2013): 1114-1120. 92 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college the standpoint of another. not only does the !rst principle serve as a mechanism through which participants in a dialogue can abstract from their own unique positions, but it also allows for a better understanding of the positions of others. "is abstraction avoids the problem of substitution because participants do not speak from the perspective of others; they use substitution as a heuristic for openness to others’ ideas. additionally, participants avoid the problem of having to calculate asymmetries between participants because all participants are equally obligated to understand others, independent of asymmetries. in doing so, participants are then able to open up a space to understand and to consider problems holistically—therefore mitigating the problem of asymmetries in discourse—and avoid relying solely on one standpoint which might be epistemically and socially-privileged. "ough it is certainly important to consider subject positioning in discourse ethics, relying on an understanding of subjectivity based on material features of a person’s identity can be in!nitely regressive. each individual can point to any number of characteristics (e.g. chinese, woman, fan of harry potter) that they consider to be an integral part of their identity and classi!cation, and it quickly becomes evident that no clear line exists for di#erentiating a person’s identity from the properties that describe them. "e implication of the di$culty in de!ning or parameterizing identity is that identity then becomes an impossible, or at least incomplete, basis for a dialogical framework, which poses a signi!cant issue for young’s asymmetrical reciprocity. furthermore, this suggests that benhabib is ultimately correct to view both concrete and generalized standpoints as important features of ethics contra young. "e ability of identity to encompass a near-in!nite number of descriptors may suggest james sterba’s objection that fully knowing the other is impossible.13 in situations that require immediate action, or those in which speci!c knowledge may be necessary, a requirement to engage in discourse may present certain challenges. moreover, as sterba argues, to tell another participant in a dialogue one’s complete personal history and identity requires a level of vulnerability, trust, and time that participants may not have or be willing to share14; nonetheless, i believe that the communicative ethics is immune to this objection. "ough a person’s identity properties may very well prove in!nite, and full knowledge of the other is impossible, participants do not need to know each other absolutely and entirely. under a communicative ethics, participants in a dialogue compelled to share their perspective must simply isolate or de!ne what segments of their identity and lived experiences are relevant to the problem at hand and do their best to make that description fungible. another objection to asymmetrical reciprocity is that it positions subjects with greater socio-political privilege in dialogues with participants that possess less power and actually incentivizes them to mis-substitute, or wrongly assuming the needs of the other. such a dialogue would allow malicious actors with privilege to promote positions in the name of 13 james p. sterba, "benhabib and rawls's hypothetical contractualism." new german critique, no. 62 (1994): 149-64. doi:10.2307/488513. 14 sterba, benhabib and rawls, 152-153. 93issue viii � spring 2021 the justification-application spectrum the worst o# that do not actually bene!t them and removes any institutional discursive check against this practice. for example, documented incidents of police brutality routinely spark societal discussions about increased police training and the use of body cameras. police departments have in fact framed the need for increased funding to conduct trainings in terms of the goal of decreasing police violence.15 yet, these increases in funding, despite claiming to be in the best interest of communities most at risk of police brutality, are in fact directly in con%ict with the aims the recent movement to defund the police and re-invest into communities.16 "e central issue with asymmetrical reciprocity which this example demonstrates is that listening to marginalized perspectives and responding to their general concerns does not necessarily imply that either the outcomes of dialogue will be in their best interest; in fact, their demands can be twisted or misinterpreted to give license to outcomes that contradict their goals. on the other hand, the communicative ethics does have a structural method of restricting such a practice. under the communicative ethics, participants in dialogues are allowed to de!ne the terms of their engagement by sharing exactly those parts of their experience which they determine to be relevant to the discussion and also to de!ne what that means in terms of shifts in practices and policies. where the dialogue about police brutality has gone wrong is that the dialogue recognized an asymmetry without actually empowering the speakers whose voices had been disadvantaged: police departments generally listened to communities’ concerns about police violence, but did not then actively seek out, follow, or prioritize the leadership and policies of organizers. should participants in dialogues with others give the highest credence to voices other than their own, as they do in the communicative ethics, participation in a dialogue can actually serve as a powerful tool that restores autonomy to speakers who have historically been denied agency. it allows them the advocacy and discursive space to reclaim ownership of their identity and desires from others. "e second de!ciency of asymmetrical reciprocity is its dependence on what young calls temporality, which makes it challenging for asymmetrical reciprocity to guide judgements and actions.17 as young de!nes it, temporality concerns the historical processes (change, continuity, and interaction with other groups) that have contributed to group identi#cation;18 it is therefore essential, young argues, that dialogue participants consider temporality in their comprehension of asymmetries between participants. nonetheless, problems may arise when temporality plays into how groups self-identify. first, many identity groups have historical rami!cations that must be grappled with, but under the framework of asymmetrical reciprocity, it is unclear what an individual’s responsibility for the temporality of his or her identity group should be. tamara k. nopper writes that asian americans !rst began to collectively identify as the racial group ‘asian’ rather 15 matt vasilogambros, “training police to step in and prevent another george floyd,” "e pew charitable trusts, june 5, 2020, https://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research-and-analysis/blogs/stateline/2020/06/05/training-police-to-step-in-and-prevent-another-george%oyd. 16 grace dickinson, “what does ‘defund the police’ mean, and what would it look like in philly?” "e philadelphia inquirer, june 10, 2020, https://www.inquirer.com/news/defund-the-police-black-lives-matter-what-does-it-mean-20200610.html. 17 young, asymmetrical reciprocity, 352. 18 young, asymmetrical reciprocity, 352. 94 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college than be ethnically divided into such groups as ‘chinese’ or ‘japanese’ in order to give weight to the model minority myth—a stereotype that was intentionally used to elevate the perception of asian americans at the expense of black americans.19 yet, if simply identifying as asian american is intrinsically antiblack, then this raises a litany of questions such as: which identities are acceptable and which are not, what constitutes an identity, and what are some of the reparations participants in dialogues may owe each other? "ese are all necessary questions to think about, but then again, only considering the context of “fruitful discourse” seems to stymie and to gatekeep an active and lively discussion. as such, navigating the complex relationships between di#erent asymmetries makes the task of recognizing temporality in asymmetrical reciprocity di$cult. in fact, recognizing the complexities of historically contingent relationships of power may point to the need for a system like the communicative ethics, where participants will inevitably be called on to acknowledge temporality under the framework of an epistemically boundless dialogue. second, while the history of relationships between groups is in one sense constitutive of asymmetries between groups, looking solely at history to de!ne power relationships may run the risk of abstracting too much from the lived experiences of participants in dialogue. by its nature as a historical descriptor, temporality is something that is constantly maturing and never static. "e relationships between di#erent communities might best be described as itself a constantly shifting dialogue, which indicates the utility of developing a system like the communicative ethics rather than rely on asymmetrical reciprocity as a framework. the justification-application spectrumthe justification-application spectrum "ough i believe that benhabib’s communicative ethics present a better model than young’s asymmetrical reciprocity, i !nd benhabib’s description of appropriate contexts for the concrete and generalized others lacking. in response to james sterba’s objections, benhabib writes that she considers two “contexts” in which action occurs: the moral standpoint (which corresponds to the concrete other) and the standpoint of institutional justice (which corresponds to the generalized other).20 for benhabib, the moral standpoint encompasses scenarios where norms are applied, making them contexts of application, whereas the standpoint of institutional justice refers to scenarios where abstract principles are justi!ed, making them contexts of justi!cation. below, i have grouped the di#erent concepts and descriptors that benhabib aligns with the mutually exclusive contexts of application and contexts of justi!cation into their respective categories. contrary to benhabib, i believe that contexts of application and those of justi!cation ought to be conceptualized as two ends of a spectrum, rather than separate contexts with no overlap. "e spectrum model is best understood as a model that explains how people’s obligations and perspectives change as new information is gathered through participating 19 tamara k. nopper, “"e unexceptional racism of andrew sullivan,” verso books. web. https://versobooks.com/blogs/3172-the-unexceptional-racism-of-andrew-sullivan. 20 benhabib, in defense of universalism, 183. 95issue viii � spring 2021 the justification-application spectrum in discursive formulations such as the communicative ethics. in essence, participants may enter into dialogues from a standpoint that is very close to either application or justi!cation but will move towards the other side as the dialogue continues; perspectives become either more applied or more justi!ed. i also contend that discourse causes conversations and participants to converge towards the middle of the spectrum, wherein the conclusions reached through conversations have elements that are both applied and justi!ed. "e spectrum model indicates how principles can exist in between purely justi!ed contexts and purely applied contexts—that we can have nuanced principles that re%ect material realities, but are still principles, rather than exceptions. for example, a professor who modi!es the norm that “extensions on papers will not be granted” to include “unless in the case of a documented family emergency” can still retain the justi!ed principle of wanting to give all students an equal amount of time on the assignment, while still accounting for the applied contexts in which students may face constraints on their time that are personal and uncontrollable. under the spectrum model, a maxim can include an exception for speci!c cases, while retaining its universal normative force as any student, through no fault of his or her own, might encounter an unforeseen emergency that meaningfully hampers his or her ability to write papers without extensions. "e spectrum model might suggest that exceptions to maxims are desirable if they could apply that the maxim would a#ect and be directly relevant to the appropriateness of the maxim’s primary subject. to illustrate what i mean, consider a classroom setting where teachers and professors must establish fair rules that govern how the class will operate, such as deadlines and consistent grading scales that are shared by all members of the class. professors construct class norms in contexts of justi!cation, where they legislate with the understanding that the norms they set will be the same for all of the students regardless of the students’ identity, educational history, or experiences; norms are enacted without reference to, or exceptions for, any particular student. but most classrooms are not so simple: as the class progresses, students may ask for extensions on assignments or for grades to be rounded up to an a. students make those requests based on concrete features of their experience unique to them, ranging from disability accommodations to hardships that they may have experienced during the pandemic. in changing or making exceptions to class policies, teachers must take a middle-ground stance between the contexts of justi!cation and application and must view their students as both 96 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college generalized and concrete. "e resulting dialogue that occurs between teachers and students and the outcome of most class norms by the end of the semester shows that there is a middle-ground between contexts of application and justi!cation, and demonstrates how stances that are in-between the ends of the spectrum are often both realistic and desirable. finally, returning to the introductory example of the badminton coach, the athletes entered the dialogue (the online conversation surrounding the coach’s actions and their allegations) from a context of application. "e medium article made note of the power imbalances present between coach and student, and quoted the athletes’ accounts of harassment, indicating an attention to individualized experiences. "ose who defended the coach by attesting to his good character and citing the principle of “innocent until proven guilty” approached the conversation from a context of justi!cation because the norms they cited were abstract and not tailored to the particulars of the situation. however, as conversations continued, participants on facebook representing both sides of the divide seemed to reach a consensus on several stances: that the coach’s character should be evaluated in light of the plethora of accusations against him and that the testimony of the athletes held comparable weight to the coach’s defense of himself. "e terms of the dialogue shifted to a middle-ground between a context of application and a context of justi!cation. and, as dialogues continued, the overall evaluation of the coach seemed to become more nuanced: participants, whether in defense of the coach or not, seemed to agree that his intentions of “joking around” and “getting comfortable” with students were separate from the e"ects of his actions on the athletes. conclusionconclusion shortly after the article was published, the coach published a post on his blog apologizing for his actions and was terminated by the badminton club. but, as conversations brought about by #metoo continue, the importance of discursive frameworks such as benhabib’s communicative ethics cannot be understated. historically, rights and laws have been created from the standpoint of the generalized other, which can foreclose important dialogue about whether principles that presuppose equality can be applied to situations where material inequalities and power imbalances are the norm. "e communicative ethics, which i have defended from the competing framework of asymmetrical reciprocity, not only provides an appropriate framework for understanding political discourse, but it also gives theorists a method of reconciling the seemingly opposite conceptions of subjectivity encompassed by the generalized and concrete others. to construct this defense of benhabib’s position, i have argued that the way that the generalized and concrete others are reconciled in real-life discursive formulations aligns best with a spectrum between justi!cation and application, rather than a binary construction where situations are either justi!ed or applied. "e spectrum model adds %exibility to benhabib’s communicative ethics as it applies to the process of creating real rules, policies, and laws. put together, the spectrum model and benhabib’s communicative 97issue viii � spring 2021 the justification-application spectrum ethics establish legitimate procedures for respectful and productive dialogue with other subjects, and can extend from typical, everyday encounters to societal policymaking. works cited benhabib, seyla. "in defense of universalism. yet again! a response to critics of situating the self." new german critique, no. 62 (1994): 173-89. doi:10.2307/488515 benhabib, seyla. ""e generalized and the concrete other: "e kohlberg-gilligan controversy and feminist "eory." praxis international, no. 4 (1985): 402-424. dickinson, grace. “what does ‘defund the police’ mean, and what would it look like in philly?” "e philadelphia inquirer, june 10, 2020, https://www.inquirer.com/news/ defund-the-police-black-lives-matter-what-does-it-mean-20200610.html. gilligan, carol. in a di"erent voice: psychological !eory and women’s development. (cambridge, ma: harvard university press, 1936). jones, trina. “"e signi!cance of skin color in asian and asian-american communities: initial re%ections.” uc irvine law review, university of california press 3 (2013): 1105-1123 nopper, tamara k. “"e unexceptional racism of andrew sullivan,” verso books. web. https://versobooks.com/blogs/3172-the-unexceptional-racism-of-andrew-sullivan. sterba, james p. "benhabib and rawls's hypothetical contractualism." new german critique, no. 62 (1994): 149-64. doi:10.2307/488513. vasilogambros, matt. “training police to step in and prevent another george floyd,” "e pew charitable trusts, june 5, 2020, https://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research-andanalysis/blogs/stateline/2020/06/05/training-police-to-step-in-and-prevent-anothergeorge-%oyd. young, iris marion. “feminism and the public sphere: asymmetrical reciprocity: on moral respect, wonder, and enlarged "ought.” constellations 3, no. 3 (1997): 340363. dianoia ix adobe 4/21.indd 42 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college ˸˽ ˵́ ̃˽ ˵ don’t get hung up in the middle yash agarwal grounding is still a relatively young topic for philosophical inquiry amongst contemporary analytic philosophers, so there is still a lack of consensus on the subject. one unanswered question is the target of grounding: can it be a tool to explain reality? is it a relation like causation or parthood? among all this uncertainty,there seems to be, even at such a young point in the life of grounding as an area of philosophical inquiry, a certain consensus or rather a dichotomy among philosophers. i’m talking about the position of the fundamentalia, entity(ies) that are thought by foundationalists to ground everything. most philosophers take grounding structures to be either top-ist or bottom-ist. according to top-ism, everything is immediately or mediately grounded by the entity of which everything else is a proper part of. !is entity is usually identi"ed with the cosmos. according to bottom-ism everything is immediately or mediately grounded by the smallest entities, the mereological atoms, whatever they may be. between top-ism and bottom-ism resides middle-ism, and it means exactly what it sounds like. middle-sized entities constitute the fundamentalia, grounding smaller entities through a downward chain (towards the mereological atoms) and larger ones through an upward chain (towards the cosmos). !is may sound peculiar at "rst but is not quite so when examined closely. sara bernstein, in her paper “could a middle level be the most fundamental?” argues for the plausibility of middle-ism. in this paper i attempt to show, o#setting bernstein’s arguments for middle-ism, how middle-ism is more problematic than its counterparts, in three ways. in carrying out this project, i don’t think that middleism is just as plausible as top-ism or 43issue ix ɢ spring 2022 don’t get hung up in the middle bottom-ism. despite this, i concede that taking a closer look at middle-ism and not simply dismissing it at the outset has its merits. !is paper tries to be representative of that. i have three objections to make. !e "rst one concerns the middle level itself and how the middle-sized fundamentalia can occupy neither one level nor multiple. !e second one appeals to the unintuitive consequences that middle-ism has based on the notion of relative fundamentality. !e third one is based on a problem that arises when talking about parthood, about how grounding direction goes both from wholes to parts and parts to wholes in middle-ism. §2 the middle level in this section, i will start o# with a brief discussion of middle-ism and the advantage that bernstein claims middle-ism holds over its rivals. !is will be followed by an analysis of the middle level which will show how the middle-sized fundamental entities can neither occupy one level, nor multiple levels, that is, a portion of the chain. finally, i will discuss a potential reply that a middle-ist could make and my response to it. let us look at middle-ism a little more closely. it might seem peculiar or absurd that the world would be structured in a way such that it is both ascending (upward chain, towards the cosmos) and descending (downward chain, towards mereological atoms) instead of either one. but, as bernstein argues, it is equally imaginable that god, instead of going with a top-ist or bottom-ist structure, decided to go with a middleist view. still, it seems as though it would be harder for god to create the middlesized entities and let the smallest and the largest entities fall out of them rather than having to create just the mereological atoms since the mereological atoms are clearly simpler, more primitive entities. i don’t mention the cosmos here since, in creating the cosmos, god would be creating everything and so among the three, creating mereological atoms seems to be the easiest. bernstein argues that middle level entities like iphones, toasters, and amoebae have an (prima facie) advantage over the fundamental entity(ies) posited by topists (the cosmos) and bottom-ists (mereological atoms). !e advantage being that these middle level entities are “perceptually available” and have “rich essences”1 , which discourage doubts regarding the nature or the explanatory power of the fundamentalia. middle-sized entities, like a human, instantiate (essential) properties like having the exact parents they have, which the cosmos and mereological atoms do not. here, perceptual availability and rich essences are being considered advantages since the fundamental entity for the top-ist, the cosmos, cannot be perceived, at least not all at once. on the other hand, the fundamental entity for the bottom-ist would 1 bernstein, s. “could a middle level be the most fundamental?”. philosophical studies, 2020: pp. 1-15. 44 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college be the mereological atoms, which we have not identi"ed, at least not yet. even if we did come to know of them, they would be out of the reaches of our perceptual abilities presumably owing to their small size. let us begin by examining the middle level. !e objection is against the advantage they supposedly have over the fundamentalia posited by top-ists or bottom-ists, that is, of having rich essences and being perceptually available. i object by saying that the list of middle level entities is indeterminate. !e consequence of this is that they lose the aforementioned advantage of being perceptually available, and so it turns out to be a disadvantage. !e question to be asked here is: are these middle-sized fundamental entities on the same level or do they occupy multiple levels? !e former may seem like the obvious answer since multiple levels would imply a hierarchy, that is, one level grounded by ones below it, which would disqualify those entities from being fundamental, but i disagree for the following reason. if they are all on the same level, one must ask: what happens when a successor of an existing middle level entity comes into existence? say for example, what would happen when the new iphone comes out? a middle-ist might answer that the new iphone would just be added to the list of the middle level entities. !e list is dynamic. however, the list cannot be dynamic because two models of the iphone cannot both be a part of the same list. !is is because any single model of the iphone can explain all the previous models and the ones to come. having two entities of the same species will result in the fundamentalia having grounds (the older generation being a ground for the newer one and vice versa, which is to say that some middle-sized entities would ground other middle-sized entities) which would disqualify them as fundamentalia altogether. !is disquali"cation i mention is based on the notion of independence, as the criteria for what counts as fundamental, as defended by bennett, over the notion of completeness, in her book making !ings up. fundamentality as independence, according to bennett, is simply the idea of being ungrounded. to say a thing is fundamental (according to independence) is to say that there are no other entities below it that ground it. completeness on the other hand is the idea that the fundamental entities must build everything above them. it does not specify that they must be ungrounded2. going back to the question of the fundamentalia occupying one level, the issue is not only that the fundamentalia would be grounded but also that an entity and its grounds cannot be on the same level of fundamentality. !is might be clear for artifacts but let us consider a non-artifact too. for example, a progeny has the genetic material to trace its family tree upward and downward. !erefore, since middle-sized objects cannot all occupy one level, it seems as though they must occupy multiple levels, that is, a portion of the chain will constitute the fundamentalia, which is absurd. i say it is absurd because of two reasons. first, 2 bennett, k. “making !ings up”. oxford: oxford university press, 2017: pp. 141-160. 45issue ix ɢ spring 2022 don’t get hung up in the middle there would remain no de"nite quali"cation that dictates which levels count as fundamentalia and which do not. for example, with the addition of new levels due to inventions or births of new members such as the latest iphone, or an amoeba undergoing cell division, there will not be any reason su$cient to make the cuto# at a speci"c level rather than the level right before or after it. since the list of middlesized fundamentalia isn’t determinate, one risks having to call all levels fundamental, in which case the notion of fundamentality becomes too expansive to be meaningful. !is makes it hard to pinpoint from exactly which level onwards do entities stop counting as fundamental. it becomes an instance of the infamous sorites paradox (hyde, dominic, and diana ra#man, sep) like the infamous sand heap problem where there is no distinct point when a heap of sand, during the removal of grains of sand one-by-one, stops being a heap3. second, going by bennett’s account of independence as the criterion for what counts as fundamental, a portion of the chain won’t be fundamental since the entities wouldn’t be ungrounded. here, the middleist might prefer the completeness picture of fundamentality, but i follow bennett in her arguments for independence over completeness, and so, devote no further discussion on it. another prima facie objection against middle-ism is the idea that middle sized objects are objects that can come into existence at any time between the beginning and the end of the universe’s life. for example, trees, rocks, and humans all pop in and out of existence at multiple times in the universe’s timeline. !is is not the case for top-ism or bottom-ism. !e cosmos and mereological atoms aren’t something that can cease to exist and reappear during a universe’s life. !ey are metaphysical, mysterious, out of our reach, or other-worldly. but in the case of middle-ism, the fundamentalia are rather short lived; they are transitory. !rough this objection, i have shown how the supposed advantage of being perceptually available and having rich essences held by middle-sized fundamentalia in middle-ism is actually a disadvantage because middle-sized entities are readily perceivable and conceivable. !ey are not mysterious or unknown entities. it is a disadvantage because of the problems that arise when looking at the question about them occupying one level or multiple levels. to the problems raised above, a middle-ist might reply that this issue, that of one or many levels, is not unique to middle-ism and hence does not disqualify it or make it less plausible than its counterparts. even for top-ism or bottom-ism, we do not know for sure whether the fundamentalia populate one or many levels. !is idea has been discussed by jonathon scha#er in his paper is !ere a fundamental level? and t.e. tahko in his paper boring in"nite descent. maybe, what we might believe to be mereological atoms are grounded in quantum energy "elds which are grounded in 3 nolan, d. “cosmic loops”. reality and its structures: essays in fundamentality. oxford: oxford university press, 2017: pp. 91-105. 46 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college smaller and smaller portions of the same "elds. in such a case it is equally unclear, as in the case of middle-ism, where to draw the line for what counts as fundamental. also, what comes right above the mereological atoms is unclear. again, it seems unlikely that right above the mereological atoms would there be something clearly perceivable like an iphone or a washing machine. it might be something like a cluster of mereological atoms, or rather, something built by mereological atoms but still equally imperceptible and with an essence almost as scant as a single mereological atom. similarly, for top-ism, what comes just below something like the cosmos is not clear. it seems unlikely that right below the cosmos there would be something perceptual, or easily comprehensible, like say, a toaster. it would probably be something along the lines of the universe-minus-one-atom. !e problem raised against middle-ism, that of where to draw the line, is present for the counterparts too, especially for bottom-ism, since there is not just one but many of these ‘atoms’ ful"lling the role of fundamentalia. since there isn’t a clear quali"cation in top-ism and bottom-ism that tells us why the fundamentalia are the way they are, it is not something that should devalue middle-ism as a plausible candidate to explain grounding structures. to the middle-ist’s reply, i concede that the problem, in the way she puts it: that we do not know what comes right below the cosmos or right above the mereological atoms either but, there is a determined line for top-ism and bottom-ism. !e cosmos and the mereological atoms are entities which are determined as fundamental. not knowing what might come right next to them does not matter since the fundamentalia are clearly de"ned. !is is not the case for the middle-sized entities since the list of fundamentalia is itself indeterminate, and as shown above, they can neither occupy one level nor multiple levels. §3 relative fundamentality in this section, i will show how, if one chooses to accept middle-ism, it results in an absurd conclusion. to do this, i will use werner’s account of relative fundamentality and then discuss a potential objection the middle-ist can make. finally, i will use werner’s theory to dismiss that reply. !e middle-ist can still attempt to argue for middle-ism by taking another route, which i will also argue against. as shown in §2, the middle-sized fundamentalia cannot occupy the same level due to the problem of entities of similar species, like newer generations of iphones. despite this, a middle-ist might still argue that middle-sized fundamentalia do occupy one level by including only the "rst member of any species of entities, like the "rst-generation iphone, but this too, i argue, is not possible for the following reason. it is obvious that all the mereological atoms would be at the same level since they are identical. but, having perceptually available middle-level entities (even if it is 47issue ix ɢ spring 2022 don’t get hung up in the middle only "rst-generations that count as fundamental) such as iphones and toasters on the same level create a problem. my objection is that accepting middle-ism would lead one to the conclusion that all the mereological atoms do not lie on the same level of fundamentality. !is comes about as follows. let us take an iphone and a toaster to be among the middle-sized entities that are part of the fundamentalia. it is obvious that an iphone is more complex than a toaster, whether that is in terms of merely the number of components involved in its assembly, the scienti"c complexity, or the level of engineering that has gone behind the product. so, from the di#erence in the natures and complexities of these two middle sized entities at hand, it follows that the number of steps of immediate grounding it takes to reach down to the level of the mereological atoms would be di#erent. !e number of steps from the iphone to a mereological atom would be more than that from the toaster to the mereological atom. for example, the steps from the iphone would be as such: iphone; motherboard; integrated cpu; cpu; gpu; silicon lattice structure; silicon atoms…… mereological atoms. !e steps from the toaster would be as such: toaster; heating coil; copper atoms…… mereological atoms. hence, we arrive at the conclusion that the mereological atoms are not all on the same level of fundamentality, which is absurd. and so, the middle-ist cannot say that the middlesized fundamental entities occupy one level. !e middle-ist, adamant on her stance, might still argue that the middle-sized fundamental entities do occupy one level. !is she justi"es by saying that one can take di#erent numbers of steps from the fundamentalia and yet get to the same level of fundamentality. which is to say that one could take a di#erent number of steps of immediate grounding to go from the fundamental level to that of the mereological atoms in di#erent cases, as shown with that of the iphone and the toaster. !is violates the account of relative fundamentality as drawn out by werner. roughly, on his account, relative fundamentality can be measured by counting down the number of steps of full immediate grounding it takes from the entity or node at hand, to the fundamental entity or entities (depending on how many fundamentalia one takes there to be)4. it is a violation of this account since despite the move made by the middle-ist which puts the mereological atoms at the same level by taking di#erent number of steps from the fundamental level, the mereological atoms arrived at in both the cases, via the iphone and via the toaster, would have di#erent values or degrees of relative fundamentality. !is is due to there being di#erent numbers of steps between them and the fundamental level. at this point the middle-ist can take one of two paths. 4 werner, j. “a grounding-based measure of relative fundamentality”. synthese, 2020: pp. 1-17. 48 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college !e "rst path the middle-ist could take is that she can accept the violation of werner’s account of relative fundamentality and take there to be indiscrete levels of fundamentality. !is will allow the middle-ist to place two mereological atoms at the same level of fundamentality even though there are di#erent steps between them and the fundamental level. !is makes the levels indiscrete because equal lengths, the toaster-mereological atom and the iphone-mereological atom, would have an unequal number of levels of fundamentality. my only response to this would be that it is overly bold to reject the best account of relative fundamentality we have in order to accommodate an already suspicious middle-ist structure of grounding, especially when no alternative has been given to explain the notion of relative fundamentality, let alone one as elaborate as werner’s. !e second path the middle-ist can take draws on the idea of plural grounding from shamik dasgupta’s on the plurality of grounds. !e idea is that a certain set of facts would together ground another fact without any one or many of the facts from the set being su$cient for the explanation of the grounded fact5. following from this, the middle-ist could say that the middle-sized fundamentalia ground everything above and below. one cannot get any more speci"c than this and so, pinpointing which middle-sized fundamentalia are grounding the grounded entity at hand is consequently not possible. i would reply to this with a di#erent proposal, which eventually fails, like before, due to werner’s notion of relative fundamentality. my proposal is a modi"cation of werner’s notion of arbitrary grounding, which he talks about in his paper arbitrary grounding. arbitrary grounding says that if we have a speci"c set of grounders, #, we cannot specify which groundee g they will ground among a group of groundees gg. borrowing werner’s example, if there are two identical doughnuts a and b on a table and you were to pick one, there is no speci"c reason why you pick, say, a over b. it’s an arbitrary choice. with the # at hand, one cannot pinpoint which groundee will emerge. so, for any given set of grounders, we cannot specify the groundee. my proposal involves %ipping the position of non-speci"city in arbitrary grounding. !e middle-ist could say that for any speci"c groundee, one cannot specify the grounder(s). so, if we talk about mereological atoms, one cannot claim which speci"c grounder(s) any mereological atom(s) came from. did a particular mereological atom come from an iphone or a toaster? one can never tell. !e only thing that can be said is that the mereological atom(s) is grounded by the middle-sized fundamentalia. but this proposal runs into trouble. even if we cannot specify which middle-sized entity is grounding which mereological atom(s), two mereological atoms coming from di#erent middle-sized entities, even though 5 dasgupta, shamik. “on the plurality of grounds”. philosophers' imprint, 2014. 49issue ix ɢ spring 2022 don’t get hung up in the middle unknowable which, can still be on di#erent levels of fundamentality with no explanation as to why that is the case. !is is problematic for werner’s account of relative fundamentality as noted earlier, so this proposal must be rejected too. in the end, maybe the dasguptian view proposed earlier could be the answer for the middle-ist to hold on to, but this view is just too generic and lacks explanatory power. it gives us no information apart from the idea that middle-sized entities ground the smaller and larger entities, which is circular since that is exactly the de"nition of middle-ism. !is dasguptian proposal is similar to an approach that is implicit in kevin richardson’s paper on what (in general) grounds what. !e idea is that one should not take speci"c instances, as i do with the iphone and the toaster. we should build from a generalized picture, starting with a broader idea and then extrapolating that to speci"c cases. for example, when talking about middle-sized fundamental entities, start by taking all of them at the same level since they are fundamental, or rather, equifundamental. in other words, we should go from broad categories to narrow cases to ensure that the central idea, that the middle-sized entities are fundamental, remains intact, and consequently that those entitites would be equifundamental, occupying one level. i object by saying that we must do exactly the opposite. it is a bad strategy to go from the broad to the narrow since the generalization can lead to dismissal of cases that are actually counterexamples to the broader idea. we must build from the narrow, speci"c cases, and only when we have enough narrow cases to build a generalized picture should we translate that notion to the broader picture. it would be wrong to start o# with a set-in-stone idea and try to force individual cases to conform to it instead of building up the idea based on the speci"c cases. bennett also endorses this idea in her book making !ings up. she argues that singular claims are prior to generalizations. broad claims, like # ground the gg, are reached by quantifying or generalizing which do not provide a reason to believe them. rather, singular claims, like this mouse is grounded by complex proteins, are what are true6. §4 parthood in this section, i will make my "nal objection against middle-ism based on an issue that arises for the middle-ist when thinking of the direction of grounding and parthood. !e issue is that a middle-ist, in trying to avoid simultaneously taking opposite monistic and pluralistic stances, would still have to take restricted versions of monism and pluralism to be true, which is problematic. like before, i will follow this objection with a potential reply from a middle-ist, and my response to it. 6 bennett, k. “making things up”. oxford: oxford university press, 2017: pp. 141-160. 50 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college before we get into my objection, let me clarify the way in which i am using the terms monism and pluralism since these terms can have di#erent connotations in di#erent contexts. for my purposes, a monist, or rather a priority monist, is someone who takes wholes to be prior to their parts and a pluralist, or a priority pluralist, takes parts to be prior to the whole that they are a part of. !is objection stems from the di#erence between monism and pluralism. in middle-ism, middle-sized entities acting as the fundamentalia would have to satisfy the conditions that are demanded both by the monist and the pluralist. let me explain using an example. almost every smartphone nowadays has an integrated chip, that is, they have multiple components like the cpu, the gpu, antennae, memory cards, etc. all soldered together onto one chip that runs the entire smartphone. for a monist, the smartphone would be prior to the integrated chip which would then be prior to the individual components of the chip. for a pluralist, the individual components would be prior to the integrated chip which would then be prior to the smartphone. so, the problem for middle-ism is that the middle-sized fundamentalia have to come prior to both the larger and the smaller entities, that is, the integrated chip will have to be prior to both the smartphone and the individual components of the chip. in other words, the middle-sized entities, in some sense, have a higher function to perform as the fundamentalia for middle-ism than in the case of the counterparts. middle-ists have to ground the chain in two directions which would mean, in some sense, that they have to possess the explanatory power of mereological atoms in a bottom-ist structure (upward chain) and the cosmos in a top-ist structure (downward chain). one might ask at this point: where is the objection here? !e integrated chip having to be prior to both the smartphone and the individual components is just the de"nition of middle-ism, that is, the middle-sized entities grounding the smaller and the bigger ones. in a way, yes! but the point i am trying to make is that middle-ism is more complicated than top-ism and bottom-ism in trying to ground both larger and smaller entities, and there is not su$cient reason for why this extra complication is needed. in other words, being a middle-ist, one cannot also be a proponent of priority monism or priority pluralism. !e middle-ist would have to (individually) deny both parts-ground-wholes and whole-grounds-parts and take some restricted version to accommodate their stance. she might do this by quantifying, maybe based on size or level of relative fundamentality, which portion of the grounding picture must follow the parts-ground-whole order and which must follow the whole-grounds-parts order. but this quanti"cation is also problematic for the same reason as was the fundamentalia occupying multiple levels. !ere would be no exact quali"cation by which the middle-ist can pinpoint exactly where the middle-sized entities stop being fundamental. as a result, middle-ism violates the occam’s razor principle 51issue ix ɢ spring 2022 don’t get hung up in the middle which says that one should prefer the simplest explanation for anything and only complicate the explanation if needed7. middle-ism, in trying to explain reality through grounding structures, further complicates our understanding without providing new insight relative to its two counterparts. !e middle-ist could have said that the advantage that middle-sized fundamentalia possess, that of being perceptually available and having rich essences, justi"es the complication, but as i have shown in the second section those traits are actually disadvantages. she might in turn use a similar strategy as earlier by saying that since the explanatory powers or abilities that the cosmos or the mereological atoms possess are still beyond us, that is, we do not have knowledge of what they are, it is equally plausible that there be middle-sized objects possess explanatory powers such that they can ground things above and below them. maybe god decided to make the world such that middle-sized entities qualify as fundamentalia. hence, the problem regarding the higher ask for the fundamentalia in middle-ism, that of grounding larger entities going up and smaller ones going down, does not necessarily make it any less plausible than its counterparts. again, i reply that the problem raised may not be unique to middle-ism, but there are de"nitely higher hurdles for middle-ism to overcome, like those highlighted in sections two and three, due to the disadvantage they possess, that of their perceptually availability and rich essences. §5 conclusion in this paper i have shown three ways in which middle-ism is a less favorable method of grounding compared to its counterparts, namely top-ism and bottom-ism. !e overarching problem that leads, in one way or another, to all my objections is the supposed advantage of perceptual availability and rich essences in middle-sized entities, that bernstein appeals to, which i have shown to be a disadvantage. !e perceptual availability and rich essences possessed by the middle-sized fundamentalia makes their nature clear, or at least clearer, than the counterparts, namely the cosmos and mereological atoms. since this clarity, that of perceptual availability and rich essences, is achieved, middle-ism faces problems such as those shown in this paper. one can look at it from an epistemic lens. it is very likely that we never come to know what the structure of the world is and so, i concede that saying that god could very well have structured the world on the basis of middle-sized entities could be just as plausible as saying that the sun, tomorrow, will rise in the west rather than the east. still, i think the problems i raise against middle-ism show, at the very least, that it is a view less plausible than its counterparts. 7 baker & alan, “simplicity”, !e stanford encyclopedia of philosophy, winter 2016 edition, edward n. zalta (ed.) 52 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college references baker, alan, “simplicity”, !e stanford encyclopedia of philosophy (winter 2016 edition), edward n. zalta(ed.), https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2016/entries/ eimplicity/ bernstein, s. 2020. “could a middle level be the most fundamental?”. philosophical studies, pp. 1-15. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11098-02001484-1 bennett, k. 2017. “making things up”. oxford: oxford university press, pp. 141-160. dasgupta, shamik. 2014. “on the plurality of grounds”. philosophers' imprint. hyde, dominic, and diana ra#man, “sorites paradox”, !e stanford encyclopedia of philosophy (summer 2018 edition), edward n. zalta(ed.), https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2018/entreis/sorites-paradox/ nolan, d. 2018. “cosmic loops”. reality and its structures: essays in fundamentality. oxford: oxford university press, pp. 91-105. richardson, k. 2020. “on what (in general) grounds what”. metaphysics, 3(1), pp. 1–15. https://doi.org/10.5334/met.18 scha#er, jonathon. 2003. “is there a fundamental level”. university of massachusetts, amherst. blackwell publishing inc. tahko, tuomas e. 2014. “boring in"nite descent”. metaphilosophy. werner, j. 2020. “a grounding-based measure of relative fundamentality”. synthese, pp. 1-17. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-020-02676-2 werner, j. 2021. “arbitrary grounding”. philosophical studies, pp. 1-21. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11098-021-01699-w 14 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college δι ά νο ια hermeneutics of heraclitus allowing concept flux gabriel bickerstaff conjoinings: wholes and not wholes, converging and diverging, harmonious dissonant; and out of all things one, and out of one all things.1 –heraclitus a thought exercise by which to consider the meaning of the above fragment might leave one feeling that there is more unsaid than said, or wondering what heraclitus is speaking in reference to. a reader might try to !ll in the blanks, considering what heraclitus’s words would mean in the context of their own experience. but heraclitus is best known for leaving the reader hanging. a forgotten poet said that heraclitus “is called ‘obscure’ because he wrote very obscurely on nature,” and aristotle complained that heraclitus omitted punctuation so that the same fragment could be read as meaning two di"erent things.2 while his di#cult style was a cause for criticism by his early readers, it remains a de!ning characteristic of heraclitus’s fragments. and whether it is despite or because of their ambiguity, the valuable philosophical potential of his words is evident in his profound in$uence on philo of alexandria and plato and his presence in historical and contemporary philosophy.3 heraclitus and his troublesome words continue to feature in philosophy 1 laks, andré, and glen w. most, early greek philosophy: early ionian %inkers part 2 (cambridge: harvard university press, 2016), 161 (d47). 2 laks and most, 209. 3 a. v. halapsis, “man and logos: heraclitus’s secret,” anthropological measurements of philosophical research 0, no. 17 (2020): 127.; charles h. kahn, %e art and %ought of heraclitus: an edition of the fragments with translation and commentary (cambridge: cambridge university press, 1979), 88. 15issue x ◆ spring 2023 hermeneutics of heraclitus published today. %is essay leans into heraclitus’s enigmatic style while exploring the space between philosophy as critical interpretive scholarship and doing philosophy or engaging authentically with concepts about the nature of things. to read heraclitus, in the sense of trying to understand what he means by what he says, presents di#culty. most philosophical literature about heraclitus tries to add some insight or perspective about what he means – to explicate more clearly what his original idea or intended meaning could be.4 such literature is good philosophical scholarship, and authors concerned with heraclitus give compelling reasons for their interpretations. however, no amount of incisive scholarship will ever allow us to fully determine heraclitus’s intended meaning.5 reasons for this include !rst, heraclitus’s own riddlesome style of expression,6 and second, the space between heraclitus and ourselves – the double barrier of having to read heraclitus through all his past exegetes as well as our own historical, philosophical, cultural and linguistic conditioning, which inevitably and inadvertently color our interpretive e"orts.7 on the worst end of this problem, interpretations are sometimes regarded as more or less authoritative based on philosophical attitudes that are preferred at a given time.8 yet, heraclitus’s historical and philosophical signi!cance makes the project of interpreting his riddles worthwhile despite these hermeneutical barriers.9 moreover, i think the philosophical value of heraclitus’s expressions inspires new philosophical development. one case of this is an essay by william desmond, in which he utilizes what he calls a “companioning approach” as a hermeneutical tool to explore heraclitus’s expressions of $ux and whether $ux is intelligible.10 desmond’s companioning seems to be a good tool both for interpreting heraclitus, and for moving beyond interpretation to doing philosophy and developing heraclitean concepts. in this essay, i support and show the merit of desmond’s companioning approach both as a hermeneutical tool, and as a means for desmond to go beyond interpretation and to philosophize with heraclitus. to support desmond’s companioning approach, i !rst depend on charles kahn, a prominent heraclitus scholar, to de!ne the hermeneutical problem. second, i explain 4 halapsis, 119-129.; c. d. c. reeve, “ekpur&sis and the priority of fire in heraclitus,” phronesis 27, no. 3 (1982): 299-305.; laura rosella schluderer, “speaking and acting the truth: %e ethics of heraclitus,” méthexis 29, no. 1 (2017): 1-19.; magdalena wdowiak, “heraclitus’s sense of logos in the context of greek root ‘leg-’ in epic poets,” classica cracoviensia 18, (2015): 459-73.; robin reames, “%e logos paradox: heraclitus, material language, and rhetoric,” philosophy & rhetoric 46, no. 3 (2013): 328-50. 5 halapsis, “man and logos: heraclitus’s secret,” 120. 6 halapsis, 119-20.; laks and most, early greek philosophy, 205-15 (r5-r15). 7 kahn, %e art and %ought of heraclitus, 87. 8 kahn, 88.; ed. l. miller, “%e logos of heraclitus: updating the report,” %e harvard %eological review 74, no. 2 (1981): 167-68. miller gives an instance of this problem where presocratic philosophers are characterized as modern positivists of scientism/empiricism. 9 kahn, %e art and %ought of heraclitus, 88. 10 desmond, william, “flux-gibberish: for and against heraclitus,” %e review of metaphysics, 70, no. 3 (2017): 473-75. 16 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college what is useful about desmond’s companioning approach and position it relative to the hermeneutical problem. %ird, i draw on pierre hadot’s insights about perennial hermeneutical problems in the history of philosophy to argue that there is a need to go beyond interpretation to engage concepts themselves, as we best understand them. fourth, i argue for the legitimacy of companioning with or thinking philosophically with heraclitus, given that this could be the kind of activity he hoped to e"ect in others. to support this view, i engage alex halapsis’ thesis that heraclitus’s obscure style was essential to his philosophical commitments and was intended to allow active philosophical thinking. %e third and fourth sections which bring in hadot and halapsis su#ce as context to show the merit of companioning as a viable approach to the problem of reading heraclitus and as a worthy philosophical activity for itself. the problem with interpreting heraclitus charles kahn saw critical interpretation of heraclitus as a worthy and limited endeavor. %rough his book he sought to better consider what the “literary artistry” of heraclitus’s fragments could lend to our interpretation of them, speci!cally qualities of expression which he called “linguistic density” and “resonance.” his resulting analysis remained open to plural meanings or “readings” existing together in heraclitus’s statements – an approach which di"ered from the precedent of limiting heraclitus to one explicitly intended meaning.11 however, kahn was realistic about the limitations and potential pitfalls of any interpretive e"ort. he notes how heraclitus’s vague quality of expression makes his ideas especially susceptible to rash misappropriation or “the free play of interpretation,” so that “every age and philosophical perspective… projected its own meaning and preoccupations onto the text of heraclitus.”12 kahn explained that any interpretation will inevitably be conditioned by the unique and unchosen perspective of the interpreter, but that there is no perfect way of engaging with heraclitus. kahn presents the problem as the di"erence between the “object-language” of the extant greek text and commentary or explications of it as “hermeneutical metalanguage,” which is our means of trying to access the object-language. %ere is no alternative way of receiving heraclitus than to make or choose a metalanguage for ourselves – a metalanguage which will more or less closely approximate what heraclitus really meant. kahn calls this problem “the hermeneutical circle.” %e best referee that we have for the metalanguage we develop is the text itself. to read heraclitus at all, we must risk some degree of misunderstanding, but we ought to be as responsible as we can.13 for kahn this is to consider how the qualities of linguistic density and resonance bear on heraclitus’s meaning. 11 kahn, %e art and %ought of heraclitus, 89, 91-92. 12 kahn, 87. 13 kahn, 87-88. 17issue x ◆ spring 2023 hermeneutics of heraclitus companioning as a hermeneutical tool %is problem of interpretation was also acknowledged by william desmond in his paper about heraclitus’s idea of $ux and implications for the intelligibility of nature that is in $ux.14 desmond’s paper is an instance of creative philosophical thinking. he presented this interpretive problem in terms of a “ventriloquizing” vs. a “companioning approach.” for desmond, ventriloquizing is what happens when someone misappropriates heraclitus so that one would “!nd in heraclitus what one brings to him.” desmond explains that in ventriloquizing, “the words we have of heraclitus function like… rorschach blobs or indeterminate pictures onto which we project ourselves.” much like a more sophisticated philosophical plagiarism, the problem with ventriloquizing isn’t the way that concepts are used per se, but the lack of de!nition around the creative philosophical exchange that is happening in the hermeneutical circle. desmond doesn’t exempt heidegger, hegel, or nietzsche from the charge of ventriloquizing to some extent with heraclitus.15 companioning, on the other hand, happens when “the thinker who occasions the re$ection is less an object of scholarly research and more one who brings forth connatural thinking in us, as we try to understand him and the matters that engage him.”16 companioning as a hermeneutical approach would free one from making a claim regarding heraclitus’s intended philosophical meaning – allowing there to be a distance between what heraclitus may have meant and what his fragments bring to mind for the contemporary reader. desmond regards heraclitus as an exemplary philosophical companion. “heraclitus o"ers us striking thoughts that strike one into thought thought that opens up philosophical porosity to the deepest perplexities.”17 what desmond seems to describe here is a more receptive, cooperative, and uninhibited disposition for engaging with a thinker. desmond’s companioning approach is his articulation of the practice of letting a piece of text move us into philosophizing. as a hermeneutical tool, companioning has the bene!t of de!ning this activity and distinguishing it from critical interpretive scholarship. history of hermeneutical problems to communicate ideas or concepts across language, space, time, culture and between persons with incongruent life experience is an inhibited project. as kahn put it, “there is the more fundamental problem that we, good classical scholars that we are, are also historical beings with a certain perspective, who can only see what is visible from where we happen to be standing.”18 it seems impossible that an idea or concept could exist the same way for me, when i read a translation of heraclitus, 14 william desmond, “flux-gibberish: for and against heraclitus,” review of metaphysics 70, no. 3 (2017): 474. 15 desmond, 473-74. 16 desmond, 473 (emphasis added). 17 see note 12 above. 18 kahn, %e art and %ought of heraclitus, 87. 18 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college as it did for him when he wrote it in his own language. i might think about the words i am reading and reference my experiences of things to lead me to a concept approximating what heraclitus intended to communicate. we may do our best, through reading critical interpretive studies, to understand heraclitus’s intended meaning, but what then? ought one to preserve these concepts as perfectly heraclitean as possible? %is seems impractical when we consider that ideas, however heraclitean they may be, relate to a very di"erent collection of conceptual data for someone in the 21st century than they did for heraclitus. for example, desmond’s work with heraclitus’s $ux doctrine was a unique philosophical project because desmond was also relating heraclitus’s $ux (or desmond’s version of heraclitus’s $ux) to nietzsche, hegel, and heidegger who came long after heraclitus. it would seem that concepts are not static, especially when they are shared between persons. we could use play-doh to think about this process of receiving, playing with and understanding concepts: my friend rachel gave me a play-doh sculpture of a bird. to understand the shape of the bird, i had to squish the play-doh and make my own bird. my bird was a bit di"erent because i have seen di"erent birds than rachel, but i had a more real concept of the shape of a bird after i made my own bird with the play-doh. %is is like the give and take of ideas or concepts. to show the merit of desmond’s companioning in this context i look to pierre hadot who understood this problem of the $ux of ideas in ancient greek philosophy and the history of philosophy. his nuanced writings are a great source for learning the subtleties of ancient thought. hadot achieved depth and breadth through steeping himself in original texts.19 hence he can provide insight into the way philosophy was done, as well as what philosophy was thought to be. in both of these ways, ancient greek philosophy facilitated philosophical freedom or innovation much more than contemporary historical study. we will look at the method or mode of ancient greek thought !rst, and then what philosophy was thought to be. hadot highlighted an incongruence between how we engage with philosophical ideas and how ancient greek philosophers did. hadot notes that the mode of philosophical activity in the “pre-cartesian period”20 was exegesis – a process which involved elaborating or explicating latent meaning in texts. %is process resulted in a plethora of what, from our contemporary philosophical attitude, would be considered inexcusable conceptual errors – ventriloquizing, to use desmond’s word. hadot was no more a fan of ventriloquizing than desmond; however, he acknowledged how exegesis allowed ideas to develop: 19 michael chase, translator’s note to philosophy as a way of life: spiritual exercises from socrates to foucault, ed. arnold i. davidson (oxford: blackwell, 1995), vi.; arnold i. davidson, introduction to philosophy as a way of life: spiritual exercises from socrates to foucault, trans. michael chase (oxford: blackwell, 1995), 1-2. 20 pierre hadot, philosophy as a way of life: spiritual exercises from socrates to foucault, trans. michael chase, ed. arnold i. davidson (oxford: blackwell, 1995), 73. 19issue x ◆ spring 2023 hermeneutics of heraclitus %e fact that authentic texts raise questions is not due to any inherent defect. on the contrary: their obscurity, it was thought, was only the result of a technique used by a master, who wished to hint at a great many things at once, and therefore enclosed the “truth” in his formulations. any potential meaning, as long as it was coherent with what was considered to be the master’s doctrine, was consequently held to be true.21 it isn’t di#cult to see how this activity could result in a plethora of meanings and conceptual sca"olding not conceived of by the author of the text in question. hadot explained that those engaged in exegetical analysis would formalize texts into new conceptual systems. other times, con$icting or unrelated concepts would be awkwardly stuck together, resulting in a philosophical frankenstein of sorts.22 however rash this might have been, hadot acknowledged the opportunity for philosophical creativity that this practice a"orded. %e modern historian may be somewhat disconcerted on coming across such modes of thought, so far removed from his usual manner of reasoning. he is, however, forced to admit one fact: very often, mistakes and misunderstandings have brought about important evolutions in the history of philosophy. in particular, they have caused new ideas to appear.23 less concern with interpretive accuracy and more interest in engaging with the concepts for themselves created the conditions of what was simultaneously philosophical innovation and philosophical distortion. hadot seems to favor the conceptual freedom of exegesis, but not the ventriloquizing it involved. %e philosophical creativity that was a"orded by exegesis helped to blaze new conceptual territory, however it came at the expense of interpretive clarity. hadot makes a couple of odd notes about this problem that are important. one is that this exegetical phenomenon has happened especially with notions of being. %e other is that he faults a strange philosophical fetish with systematizing ideas for causing exegetical distortion. hadot explained that one exegetic o"ense against the philosopher being explicated was to impose a system onto their ideas. he stated: “systematization amalgamates the most disparate notions which had originated in di"erent or even contradictory doctrines.” and “philosophical thought utilized a methodology which condemned it to accept incoherences and far-fetched association, precisely to the extent that it wanted to be systematic.”24 however hadot clari!es that this exegetical systematization is di"erent from modern notions of system and that 21 see note 18 above. 22 hadot, 74-75. 23 hadot, 75. 24 hadot, 75-76. 20 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college modern idealist e"orts to replace exegesis with pure reason also failed and relapsed back into exegesis.25 hadot is correct when he says that now, “historians seem to consider all exegetical thought as the result of mistakes or misunderstandings.”26 %is complaint has been made by and about interpreters of heraclitus. for scholars like kahn, concerned only with discerning heraclitus’s original intended meaning, “the various levels of exegesis and distortion,” has made this task more di#cult.27 %ough hadot values the free engagement with ideas a"orded by exegesis, he does not see interpretive mistakes as a good thing. rather, he faults contemporary exegesis for “the same violence used by ancient practitioners of allegory.”28 %is, shall we call it a curate’s egg phenomenon, i think speaks to the need for allowing old philosophical texts to catalyze new philosophical developments. however, there should perhaps be a way for this to be done without ascribing new variants of an idea to the author of its original form. blame for conceptual innovation need not always be thrown back to whoever’s work inspired it – an exegete can take philosophical responsibility. i think this is what companioning allows. hadot also provides insight into what philosophy was thought to be in antiquity. he helps us understand that philosophy was not a project of de!ned concepts logically related in deductive argument. rather, it was somewhat $uid since it was meant to be deeply transformative and relevant to life. hadot’s presentation of this kind of thinking is philosophy as “spiritual exercises.”29 hadot unpacks spiritual exercises in a descriptive way, highlighting their presence as a point of unity in the thought of diverse groups and !gures including plato, socrates, the stoics, epicureans and neoplatonists.30 spiritual exercises were activities done intentionally to a"ect some inner improvement within the person. %ey were spiritual because of the “level” at which they worked in the person. hadot explained that “these exercises are the result, not merely of thought, but of the individual’s entire psychism” and “the philosophical act is not situated merely on the cognitive level, but on that of the self and of being. it… causes us to be more fully, and makes us better.”31 hadot presents ancient thought as operating on more dimensions than merely the cognitive – one might say they cause ontological and moral augmentation within a person. further, they are exercises because they are activities done intentionally, which in a manner analogous to “physical exercises,” have the power of causing this deep spiritual (ontological, moral, cognitive) improvement.32 25 hadot, 76. 26 hadot, 74. 27 kahn, %e art and %ought of heraclitus, 87. 28 hadot, philosophy as a way of life, 76. 29 hadot, 83, 81. 30 hadot, 101-02, 81-109. 31 hadot, 82-83. 32 hadot, 102. 21issue x ◆ spring 2023 hermeneutics of heraclitus understanding philosophy as somewhat of a self-improvement project provides another account for why less emphasis had been placed on the integrity of concepts as communicated and received. philosophy was not to be understood for its own sake, but for the sake of a"ecting human change to which the constancy of ideas took secondary importance. it is as though the concepts had to adopt the $uid quality of the ontological change they were meant to a"ect. to read heraclitus in light of hadot’s insights about the nature and methods of antique thought would require us to exchange the relative importance we give to getting heraclitus right for the value of concepts we derive from his riddlesome expressions as catalysts for helping us think about the nature of things and of ourselves. %is is desmond’s companioning approach, in which heraclitus “brings forth connatural thinking in us, as we try to understand him and the matters that engage him.”33 some have even gone as far as to claim that heraclitus intended to make us think for ourselves. heraclitus as a companion alex v. halapsis claimed this as part of his thesis that the center of heraclitus’s program was a philosophical anthropology34 – a theory that the soul’s self-consciousness after death depended on its wisdom or how intellectually awake it had made itself during life. halapsis accounted for what heraclitean notions of being awake and of having a dry or !ery vs wet soul mean as expressions of the relative immortality of the soul. according to halapsis, heraclitus would have understood the soul as immortal by nature, but only immortal in the sense of achieving “self-awareness” if it made itself so during life. for heraclitus, this meant to actualize its logos which is what it meant to be awake, dry, !ery, wise etc. and this sort of ontological transformation could happen only through “active participation in the cognitive process.”35 halapsis thought that heraclitus remained obscure to force us to awaken. our salvation, which is our enlightenment, depends on us to actively and e"ortfully inquire for ourselves into the nature of things – a process which stops as soon as someone saves us the trouble by telling us explicitly. hence, heraclitus refused to be explicit. halapsis contrasts heraclitus with pythagoras for whom wisdom consisted of a dogmatist program of truths spoon-fed to naïve minds. “but the fact is that comprehending other people’s doctrines is certainly the wrong way. wisdom cannot be “borrowed” from others; it cannot be ‘copied’ into one’s head. knowing ten wise doctrines will not make anyone a ‘tenfold’ sage.” in halapsis’s view, heraclitus wanted rather to inspire the movement to wisdom. hence, “i searched (for) myself,”36 33 desmond, “flux-gibberish,” 473. 34 halapsis, “man and logos: heraclitus’s secret,” 120. 35 halapsis, 125, 125-27. 36 halapsis, 124.; laks and most, early greek philosophy, 155. 22 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college %is is the part of halapsis’s thesis that supports the general disposition behind desmond’s companioning approach – of relaxing e"orts to pin down what heraclitus is saying about the way things are. %is is because, in halapsis’s account, heraclitus didn’t make explicit statements about things lest someone too quickly assent, precluding their own searching and awakening. if desmond’s companioning approach means something like allowing a philosopher’s expression to make us think for ourselves, then halapsis’s account would be that heraclitus intended to be companioned with – accompanied shall we say in his obscurity. noteworthy is how closely halapsis’s thesis of heraclitus’s philosophical anthropology aligns with hadot’s presentation of spiritual exercises. both are a deep (perhaps ontological) growth a"ected within the person through some intentional activity – active inquiry in the case of heraclitus. i would argue that halapsis’ heraclitus would !t comfortably among hadot’s examples of the spiritual exercises of antiquity, however hadot had reasons for framing spiritual exercises “from socrates to foulcault,” and a defense for including heraclitus would require a separate essay. desmond’s companioning with heraclitus it is worthwhile here to approach desmond’s thesis about “$ux-gibberish” in as much as it helps us get a better sense of his companioning with heraclitus. in his paper, desmond proposes that heraclitus’s expressions, despite seeming ambiguous and illogical, have metaphysical signi!cance because they indicate a form of being which more de!nite or lucid statements fail to capture. he thinks that heraclitus, in his obsession with the constancy of the logos and the $ux of opposites and becoming, can be read as expressing the “overdeterminacy” of being, and that this overdeterminacy is spoken through expressions that have a “saturated equivocity.”37 what does desmond mean by saturated equivocity? he explains that with both heraclitus’s $ux doctrine and the logos that is a principle of constancy, he is working between “the constancy of form” and “the $uency of $ux” so that expressions of the two are “synchronically superposed.”38 %ey are expressed simultaneously and together to get at an overdeterminacy of being that doesn’t come through in univocal language. “what i am calling the saturated equivocity of heraclitus’s discourse is his entry into the space of the overdeterminate, and out of that space his e"ort to speak the superposition of seeming opposites that calls for utterance there. %ere is a oneness to it.”39 desmond explains that the equivocal opposites that are saturated and superposed are one in this overdeterminacy. he describes overdeterminacy as a “too-muchness,” found in art for example, in which “there is an abiding inexhaustibility, a source enabling of in!nite astonishment, an origin out of 37 desmond, “flux-gibberish,” 480, 496. 38 desmond, 484, 486. 39 desmond, 496. 23issue x ◆ spring 2023 hermeneutics of heraclitus which !nite articulations emerge but which itself exceeds all !nite articulations.”40 desmond thinks that heraclitus’s expressions capture the overdeterminacy, rather than making it determinate, which is why they seem indeterminate and don’t make sense. “%ere is an overload of signi!cance that can look idiotic; when (st)uttered the overdeterminacy looks idiotic.”41 to use desmond’s descriptor, there is too much for heraclitus to express, so his expressions are also too much for our univocal minds to process without desmond helping us understand their doubleness or equivocity. how do we understand this reading of heraclitus by desmond as companioning rather than the ventriloquizing of which he accuses heraclitus’s modern readers? believing that heraclitus’s modern exegetes didn’t sound the full depth of heraclitus’s sense of the overdeterminacy of being as expressed through saturated equivocal language, desmond appears only to be o"ering an alternative interpretation. but perhaps desmond receives this insight through companioning with heraclitus. he explained that a reader who is committed to univocal intelligibility will mistake heraclitus’s equivocity for logical contradictions, thus ventriloquizing with him. “we quickly construct more coherent theories, or perhaps ventriloquize a meaning through selected sayings of heraclitus, a meaning less insolent to our more univocal measures of determinate argumentation.”42 %is attempt to nail down heraclitus, to massage away the incoherencies or to get rid of the parts that don’t !t as we think they should – this seems to be ventriloquizing. we could consider this in light of the violent exegetical tendency towards systematization highlighted by hadot. ventriloquizing seems to be an instance of this phenomenon – also remarkably happening with the notion of being. but is even desmond ventriloquizing? he claims to be companioning but admits that “it may be impossible to avoid ventriloquizing entirely.”43 desmond is expressing heraclitus in his metaphysical lexicon. indeed, he is, with the rest of us, condemned to the “hermeneutical circle”.44 but i think that companioning is real, and that desmond is doing it. and i think companioning is slightly more helpful as a hermeneutical tool because it is more form-!tting. it requires a more receptive and relaxed disposition, allowing the text of the author to distinguish itself. we could think back to desmond’s statement: “heraclitus o"ers us striking thoughts that strike us into thought.” in this expression of companioning, heraclitus’s fragments take the position of agency, a"ecting the reader. %is arrangement allows the words of heraclitus to cause us to think and re$ect with heraclitus, perhaps even allowing our thought to pattern heraclitus’s more closely. at the same time, it relieves 40 desmond, 498. 41 desmond, 502. 42 desmond, 488. 43 desmond, 474. 44 kahn, %e art and %ought of heraclitus, 88. 24 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college us of having to make sense of heraclitus or risk pro"ering a de!nitive account of what heraclitus himself meant. conclusions some remarks can be made about desmond’s place among our three reference points, kahn, hadot and halapsis: kahn thought that attending to qualities of heraclitus’s expressions such as resonance and density could add to our understanding of what his words mean. while kahn’s work has its merits, desmond’s project also attends to the poetic quality of heraclitus’s fragments. and because desmond companions with heraclitus and is doing philosophy rather than mere interpretive scholarship, he can suggest that heraclitus’s words have a saturated equivocity which expresses an overdeterminacy, with the result that their meaning comes by means of apparent contradictions. hadot shows that not only has something like desmond’s ventriloquizing been happening for the entire history of philosophy through systematization and creative misinterpretation, but that there is an extent to which this is inevitable and necessary. scholars’ honesty about the hermeneutical problems and pitfalls is already a huge step forward, but companioning could be the next step by legitimizing the tendency for a philosophical companion to “strike one into thought,” – into doing philosophy, and distinguishing this project from strict interpretive scholarship. what desmond is doing in trying to identify the metaphysics behind heraclitus’s saturated expressions is, i would argue, something like what halapsis claims that heraclitus hoped others would do to awaken their logos and “connect” with the logos to make themselves immortal.45 if halapsis is correct that heraclitus intended to be obscure for this reason, then companioning, or the general attitude of letting ourselves be struck into thought, would be an appropriate way of engaging with heraclitus’s fragments. companioning is an important hermeneutical activity, distinct from the critical interpretive work of charles kahn, yet equally important, especially for those who are perhaps more concerned than kahn with the rich philosophical potential in heraclitus’s expressions. kahn stresses that our being trapped in the hermeneutical circle does not mean “that interpretation is a game with no rules, which anyone can play and in which no mistakes are possible.”46 kahn is right. however, companioning allows us to step outside the game of interpretation and to do philosophy; we are free from “rules,” free to make mistakes and engage heraclitus on philosophical rather than interpretive grounds. companioning is a part of “the formulation of the thoughts that are dearest to one’s own intellectual and spiritual concerns. [...] 45 halapsis, “man and logos: heraclitus’s secret,” 125-26. 46 see note 46 above. 25issue x ◆ spring 2023 hermeneutics of heraclitus one may be !nding one’s own voice, but into that voice the heard voice of the companion may have entered intimately.”47 a worthy activity might be to read heraclitus fragments slowly and re$ectively while letting the ideas, however they are received, react with one’s internal milieu of other philosophical voices and personal experiences, considering possible implications for how to perceive the world and oneself.48 47 william desmond, “despoiling the egyptians gently: merold westphal and hegel,” gazing %rough a prism darkly: re$ections on merold westphal’s hermeneutical epistemology, ed. b. keith putt (new york: fordham university press, 2009), 23. 48 grateful recognition goes to professors christopher bobier, patricia calton and joseph tadie, as well as to the editorial board at dianoia for critical reviews and helpful feedback during the writing process. 26 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college references chase, michael. translator’s note to philosophy as a way of life: spiritual exercises from socrates to foucault, vi-viii. edited by arnold i. davidson. oxford: blackwell, 1995. davidson, arnold i. introduction to philosophy as a way of life: spiritual exercises from socrates to foucault. translated by michael chase. oxford: blackwell, 1995. desmond, william. “flux-gibberish: for and against heraclitus.” review of metaphysics 70, no. 3 (2017): 473-505. desmond, william. “despoiling the egyptians gently: merold westphal and hegel,” gazing !rough a prism darkly: re"ections on merold westphal’s hermeneutical epistemology. edited by b. keith putt. new york: fordham university press, 2009. hadot, pierre. philosophy as a way of life: spiritual exercises from socrates to foucault. translated by michael chase. edited by arnold i. davidson. oxford: blackwell, 1995. halapsis, a. v. “man and logos: heraclitus’s secret.” anthropological measurements of philosophical research 0, no. 17 (2020): 119-29. kahn, charles h. !e art and !ought of heraclitus: an edition of the fragments with translation and commentary. cambridge: cambridge university press, 1979. laks, andré, and glen w. most. early greek philosophy: early ionian !inkers part 2. cambridge: harvard university press, 2016. miller, ed. l. “%e logos of heraclitus: updating the report.” !e harvard !eological review 74, no. 2 (1981): 161-76. reames, robin. “%e logos paradox: heraclitus, material language, and rhetoric.” philosophy & rhetoric 46, no. 3 (2013): 328-50. reeve, c. d. c. “ekpur&sis and the priority of fire in heraclitus.” phronesis 27, no. 3 (1982): 299-305. schluderer, laura rosella. “speaking and acting the truth: %e ethics of heraclitus.” méthexis 29, no. 1 (2017): 1-19. wdowiak, magdalena. “heraclitus’s sense of logos in the context of greek root ‘leg-’ in epic poets.” classica cracoviensia 18, (2015): 459-73. dianoia ix adobe 4/21.indd 18 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college ˸˽ ˵́ ̃˽ ˵ heroes or villains?: a lockean approach to justifying vigilantism rebekah locke §1 introduction it has long been argued that the state has a monopoly on the legitimate use of violence and imposition of sanctions. but what happens in cases where the state fails to e!ectively carry out its duties of punishment and protection? "at is where vigilantes come in. many philosophers deny that vigilantism can ever truly be justi#ed. i disagree, and i believe more people agree with me than they know. "ink of the vigilantes we see in movies and television. we call these people heroes, or even superheroes (just look to the massive success of the recent superhero “avengers” movies). as an audience, we laud these rogue crime-#ghters: the lonely cop against a crooked police force, a man seeking justice for a murder that was dismissed due to negligence or corruption, a serial killer who hunts and kills other serial killers. as an audience, we seem to accept vigilantism. why then, are we so loath to accept it as politically justi#able? "at is what i aim to explore. vigilantism refers to the non-state sanctioned punishment of criminals and is justi#ed in certain speci#c instances, namely in a “pseudo-state of nature.” a pseudostate of nature is a state in between the chaos of a full-blown state of nature (the state into which man is born and exists until some form of order or government is put in place) and the order of an established socio-political state. "is is a state wherein the established order has failed in some critical aspect, such as apprehension or punishment of criminals. i will elaborate on the concept of a “pseudo-state of nature” in section three. using a lockean approach to governmental rights (which i explain in 19issue ix ɢ spring 2022 heroes or villains section two), i apply the “natural executive right”—a right to punish transgressions that philosopher john locke believed belonged to all people in a state of nature—in these “pseudo-states of nature,” the end result of which is a philosophical justi#cation for vigilantism. i believe that vigilantism is a reasonable and justi#able response to wrongdoings when the state fails to uphold its duties of punishing criminals and protecting its citizens. "at is what i seek to prove in this paper. §1 defining the phenomenon in this paper i aim to justify only the speci#c phenomenon known as crime-control vigilantism. crime-control vigilantism is what we normally think of when we think of vigilantism. as h. jon rosenbaum and peter sederberg de#ne it, crime-control vigilantism “is directed against people believed to be committing acts proscribed by the formal legal system1.” vigilantes are concerned with the same criminals with which the state normally would be concerned. "is type of vigilantism occurs especially when the state or establishment fails or is seen to be ine!ectual: "e primary causes of these activities [crime-control vigilantism] are disillusionment with the government’s ability to enforce the laws and, apparently, the belief that the police are corrupt. "ese cases are examples where groups normally classi#ed as potential participants in dissident violence share certain values with the established legal system and are attempting to extend the enforcement of these shared norms into their neglected communities.2 crime-control vigilantism is characterized by actions that ultimately coincide with the norms of the state even though they may involve the transgression of those same norms. speci#cally, the term vigilante, as i use it, refers to a person or group of persons who protect and restore the establishment (except in cases where the establishment has enacted evil laws, but more on this later) through the use of extralegal actions in situations where the state or legal system has failed to function properly in some crucial way. in their essay “vigilantism: an analysis of establishment violence,” rosenbaum and sederberg classify vigilantism as “establishment violence.” establishment violence is violence with the goal of maintaining or defending the established order.3 it is not violence aimed at the establishment but rather at restoring the establishment. vigilantes are concerned with the ideals and motives of the established order but feel they must resort to actions that violate the formal boundaries of that order to protect it. "e idea that they must act outside of the established order to protect 1 jon rosenbaum and peter sederberg. "vigilantism: an analysis of establishment violence." in vigilante politics. philadelphia: university of pennsylvania, (1976). 3-29. 10. 2 ibid, 3. 3 ibid, 4. 20 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college that order—the feeling that the existing order is so corrupt that one cannot feasibly correct it from within—is what makes “establishment violence” true vigilantism. moreover, for actions to be considered vigilantism they need to be both voluntary and completely divorced from the state; the vigilante cannot be accountable to the state in any way. vigilantism occurs when the state has been rendered ine!ective, or at the very least, when the state appears ine!ective. vigilantism, as i will use it for the remainder of my argument, is the use or threat of violence by voluntary agents acting without regard for state approval and directed toward protecting the reasonably just morality of a given community and maintaining objective security within that group.4 furthermore, and most importantly, vigilantism is a reaction to crime or transgressions of an established order, especially when that order has been rendered ine!ective in some way5. i believe it is the “natural executive right”—our individual right to punish all transgressors in the state of nature—that justi#es vigilantism. §2 the natural executive right6 before we discuss locke’s “natural executive right,” we must #rst explain his concept of a “state of nature.” a state of nature is the state into which all men are born and in which there is no socio-political order. all men are free from laws and governance until some overarching order is formed. in his two treatises of government, locke argued that all men are naturally free—that they are born into a state of nature—and, as such, have certain inherent rights, such as the right to life, liberty, and property7. it is only in the formation of a social or political order or government that man leaves the state of nature. in this formation, man voluntarily transfers his natural rights to the state. it is through this voluntary transfer of man’s natural rights that the state gets its own rights, such as the right to make and enforce laws. "erefore, when the state fails or is disbanded, man is returned to a state of nature and his natural rights are returned. among the natural rights that locke believed man to have is the “natural executive right,” which includes the right to punish any and all transgressions of the law of nature. let us begin this discussion of locke’s “natural executive right” by examining why he argued that it is a right belonging to all people in a state of nature. in the second treatise of government, locke claims: 4 "is de#nition is derived from two articles on the subject of vigilantism: travis dumsday’s "on cheering charles bronson: "e ethics of vigilantism" and les johnston’s "what is vigilantism?" 5 travis dumsday, "on cheering charles bronson: "e ethics of vigilantism." "e southern journal of philosophy xlvii (2009): 49-67. 60. 6 "e existence of the natural executive right is a contentious one, with many detractors arguing that such a right is even paradoxical in nature. for a full yet ultimately unconvincing argument against the natural executive right, see je!rie murphy’s "a paradox in locke's "eory of natural rights." for the purpose of this paper, however, because i am focusing on arguing for the legitimacy of vigilantism, i urge the reader to simply take the existence of the ner as a conditional; if the natural executive right as i argue for it exists then vigilantism is justi#ed. 7 alex tuckness,"locke's political philosophy", "e stanford encyclopedia of philosophy (spring 2016 edition), edward n. zalta (ed.), url = <http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2016/entries/locke-political/> 21issue ix ɢ spring 2022 heroes or villains to justify bringing such evil [punishment] on any man two things are requisite. first that he who does it has commission and power to do so. secondly, that it be directly useful for the procuring of some greater good . . . usefulness, when present, being only one of those conditions, cannot give the other, which is a commission to punish. 8 locke believed that punishment is only acceptable when those who execute it have the commission and power to do so. "is authoritative power to punish comes from what locke calls the “natural executive right.” "is right gives all individuals in a state of nature the “right to punish the transgressors of that law [of nature] to such a degree as may hinder its violation9.” it is from the transfer of this right from the individual to the state, locke contends, that the government attains the power to punish its citizens. as the #rst of his three arguments for the “natural executive right” has no bearing on my concept of vigilantism, i will skip directly to his second and third arguments. locke’s second argument for the existence of a natural executive right links the natural executive right with the right to preserve humankind. locke argues that it is an inherent right in a state of nature to protect and preserve humankind through punishment. broadly construed, the right to preservation could include the right not only to defend others when they are under attack but also the right to create a “deterrent climate” through punishment and preemptive attacks10. for the right to preserve humankind through proper punishment, it must be construed in the broad sense because punishment involves much more than defense during an attack: “[p] unishment begins where defense leaves o!11.” it is to this broad construal of the right to preserve humankind that locke appeals. punishment of crimes, in the sense that it deters future criminals from acting, becomes a form of protection against future attacks, a protection in which all people have an interest12. "is is how our natural right to protect mankind validates the “natural executive right.” "e third argument locke gives for the “natural executive right,” the right that all people are endowed with to punish any and all transgressions in a state of nature, comes from an examination of the government’s right to punish. "e government has a right to punish criminals, but as the government gets its power solely from the voluntary transfer of natural rights from the citizens who agree to be governed,13 individuals must have the natural right to punish before there is a government. it follows that individuals in a state of nature—existing before or outside of 8 jon a. simmons. ""e right to punish." in "e lockean "eory of rights. princeton, n.j.: princeton university press, (1992). 121-66. 122. 9 john locke. "e second treatise of government. (1689). reprint, new york: "e liberal arts press, (1956). 6. 10 simmons, 136. 11 ibid. 12 ibid, 137. 13 ibid, 123-4. 22 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college government—have the right to punish wrongdoers themselves. it is from the transfer of our natural rights that locke believes the government gains the commission and power to punish. however, in situations where the state has failed or does not exist, the rights of the people return to the individual. "is gives individuals the right to punish when there is no state or when the state has failed in some critical manner (a “pseudo-state of nature”). "is is why i believe that what locke calls the “natural executive right,” applied in a “pseudo-state of nature,” justi#es vigilantism14. §3 the pseudo-state of nature having established the possibility15 of a natural executive right that would allow individuals in a state of nature to punish wrongdoers, what impact does this have for our attempts to justify vigilantism? it seems quite obvious that most humans do not exist in a “pre-political” state; only rarely can one #nd individuals living without some form of socio-political structure, and states of complete political dissolution do not last long. but when the state ceases to function properly in important aspects such as punishment and crime-deterrence—if it fails partially with respect to some of its duties while still functioning in every other aspect—it becomes, in a very relevant sense, like a state of nature. i call these situations “pseudo-states of nature.” "ese pseudo-states of nature are akin to a full-blown state of nature in the sense that the state or socio-political order in such a pseudo-state has failed in some critical way. it is not that a state or established order does not exist in these circumstances. rather, the state or established order is so ine!ective in certain aspects that it is as if it were absent in those respects. as i argue, crime-control vigilante justice is permissible in these “pseudo-states of nature” precisely because they are instances where the state fails in some ways but still maintains a semblance of governance in other ways. "e relevant state failures for this discussion on vigilantism are the failure to punish those who transgress the laws (or morality in the case of a corrupt government) of the society it governs and the failure to protect its citizens from danger and loss of security. "e crucial characteristic of a pseudo-state of nature is that it is a state that has not yet degraded into chaos—there is still an overarching structure, the skeleton of the state. "e laws, procedures, and all other facets of the establishment still exist in a pseudo-state of nature. "e only thing that is missing, in the cases i am focusing on, is a properly functioning system of punishment, or, in some situations, a properly working legislative body. in these situations, the state simply fails in one or two aspects. as the state gets its right to punish from our right to punish others (locke’s 14 together, all three of locke’s arguments for the natural executive right (including the one i have not addressed) make as strong a case as any competing explanation of the natural executive right, the right to punish wrongdoings in a state or pseudo-state of nature. what i have aimed to do here is make a case for the natural executive right as at least as plausible as any other theory. 15 "ere are still a great many detractors toward the “natural executive right,” and as i do not have room in this paper to argue all of these points, from here on my argument is conditional, operating under the assumption that the “natural executive right” is real and that, applied in a pseudo-state of nature, justi#es vigilantism. 23issue ix ɢ spring 2022 heroes or villains conception of the “natural executive right”), when the state cannot or does not punish, we can, and should, temporarily take back that right and punish wrongdoers ourselves. in these pseudo-states of nature vigilantes #ll the gap, so to speak, stepping in, in many cases, for the state but also for the community as a whole. states that are only temporarily without a properly functioning system of punishment can survive if someone—a vigilante—takes over that one function until the state is working properly. although he does not speci#cally call them pseudo-states of nature, travis dumsday, in his article “on cheering charles bronson: "e ethics of vigilantism,” outlines four situations in which vigilantism is permissible. i believe that all of these situations are examples of pseudo-states of nature and cover most, if not all, pseudo-state of nature circumstances relevant to vigilantism. "e four situations are: 1) "e state has enacted good laws but is failing to enforce them; 2) "e state has failed to enact certain good laws; 3) "e state has enacted evil laws; and 4) "e state has enacted good laws and is enforcing them16. in the #rst circumstance, when the state has enacted good laws but is failing to enforce them, the legislative aspect of the state is functioning properly but the executive branch is not punishing transgressions of these laws. "is can happen for a number of reasons. if the police force or other players in the justice system are corrupt,17 have ulterior motives (such as racist agendas), or are simply inept, then they will ultimately fail to uphold the system of punishment the state has put in place. in such cases, individuals not only have the right to protect themselves from criminal activities, they also have the right to punish transgressors because the state has failed to do so. such instances seem to be fairly clear examples of pseudo-states of nature in that the state is functioning properly in some aspects but has failed completely in others, mainly the punishment of criminals. vigilantes are concerned with the same criminals with which the state should normally be concerned. instances of grievous injustice, such as when a murderer is acquitted because evidence was obtained illegally or because he bribed or intimidated jurors, should be considered failures of the state under this conception of pseudo-states of nature. in such cases, the state is unable to punish wrongdoers and protect its citizens e!ectively. "e state itself may not be corrupt or willfully blind, but, because of forces out of the state’s control or mistakes made along the way, the state has failed to completely uphold its duties, becoming a pseudo-state of nature. "e second situation in which the state has failed to enact good laws is slightly more di$cult to justify. dumsday explains these circumstances as ones where a state has failed to prohibit actions that, from a rational point of view, would have been deemed 16 dumsday, 58. 17 ibid. 24 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college wrong or breaches of natural law18. for example, if a theoretical state did not prohibit murder or rape, or, in a more realistic example, excluded certain races, religions, or creeds from protection, then it has not enacted good laws19. dumsday also includes under this category instances of a state enacting good laws but failing to endorse su$cient punishment20. in this case, a government may prohibit murder but attach a grievously insu$cient punishment to its transgression—dumsday uses the example of a one week jail sentence21. it is helpful, in defending dumsday’s argument, to use the idea of the morality of a state. if we look to the general morality of the citizens in a corrupt state as establishing the proper norms, it becomes easier to argue that the state has failed in some way by not enacting certain laws or su$cient punishment. "e same principle applies to dumsday’s third category, instances where the state has enacted evil laws22. it would seem impossible, to some degree, for a state to enact “evil” laws if the laws are merely a construct of the state alone. but if the state enacts laws that go against the overall morality of its community, such as the sterilization of mentally ill individuals or the prohibition or limiting of african american voting rights, when the community feels these actions are unethical, then the state has failed. also, if the state itself is evil, such as in nazi germany, and is enacting laws that do not align with the majority morality of its community, then such laws can be considered evil, and the state has failed in its duties to protect its citizens. "e fourth and #nal situation in which vigilantism is permissible according to dumsday is when the state has enacted good laws and is enforcing them23. dumsday begins his explanation of these situations by noting that this is the hardest circumstance in which to justify vigilantism24. "is last category does not clearly describe a pseudo-state of nature and is therefore an exception, but a very small one. "e only types of vigilantism that are permissible in cases where the state has enacted good laws and is enforcing those laws properly, according to dumsday, is when the vigilante has a certain skill that can aid law enforcement25. in these situations, the vigilante in question has some ability that the state does not. it is important to note, however, that the vigilante is not willingly accountable to the state; he is not working with law enforcement, hired by the state, or in any other way responsible to the state. "e most prominent example of this would be superheroes with special powers that law enforcement o$cers do not have. another more realistic example is the specialized skill of hunting and trapping runway criminals26. in either case, if the vigilante uses his skills to help the police but does not hold himself accountable 18 ibid, 61. 19 ibid, 61-2. 20 ibid, 62. 21 ibid. 22 ibid, 64. 23 ibid. 24 ibid. 25 ibid. 26 ibid. 25issue ix ɢ spring 2022 heroes or villains to the state and does not need the state’s approval then this would be, according to dumsday, an acceptable use of vigilantism. §4 objections to vigilantism "e conception of vigilantism as “establishment violence” stemming from the “natural executive right” and only applying in a pseudo-state of nature still does not satisfy some theorists. alon harel, an opponent of vigilantism, argues that the state has a monopoly on the use of force to punish or protect27. harel argues that criminal sanctions are legitimate only because they are state in%icted. although harel gives three arguments against privately-imposed sanctions, only his integrationist argument pertains to vigilantism as i have de#ned it. in this section i will examine harel’s integrationist condition for the right to punish as it applies in a pseudo-state of a nature, and, as a result, will prove that it does not preclude vigilantism as i have argued for it. harel’s most important argument for the legitimacy of state-exclusive criminal punishments comes from his integrationist, or state-centered, argument. "is roughly means that the power to punish is an “agent-dependent” power; only the state can punish because state-imposed sanctions are designed to realize speci#c goals and perform speci#c tasks28. another way to explain harel’s argument is to say that criminal sanctions are, fundamentally, an expression of the community’s disapproval of criminal acts29. as such, only the state can in%ict legitimate punishment because only the state, and not private entities or other individuals, speaks for the community. privately in%icted sanctions may serve some of the other functions of punishment, such as deterrence or retribution, but they will never embody the symbolic signi#cance that state-imposed sanctions do30. "is view—that state-exclusive punishment is the only legitimate form of punishment because it is part of the duties and powers of the state—is what harel calls an integrationist justi#cation31. "e state’s right to punish, then, is entirely tied to its power to issue prohibitions in the #rst place32. "is integrationist justi#cation for state in%icted sanctions relies on the premise that punishment of criminal transgressions is part of the state’s network of rights and duties. to take this away from the state—to allow for the privatization of punishment—would fundamentally disrupt its proper functioning33. "e state sets 27 harel has three arguments against the “natural executive right”—instrumental, normative, and integrationist. only his integrationist argument is germane to my premise and so that is what i will focus on. for harel’s full argument against the natural executive right see alon harel. "why only the state may in%ict criminal sanctions: "e case against privately in%icted sanctions," legal "eory 14 (2008): 113-33. 28 alon harel, "why only the state may in%ict criminal sanctions: "e case against privately in%icted sanctions." legal "eory 14 (2008): 113-33. 118. 29 ibid. 30 ibid. 31 ibid, 123. 32 ibid. 33 ibid, 125. 26 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college the prohibitions, and so it must also set and consequently enforce the punishments attached to these prohibitions if these punishments are to be just34. harel goes as far as to say that a society without a system of state-issued punishments for the violation of norms or laws is “tantamount to . . . a stateless existence35 36.” for the state to be e!ective—for it to govern justly—it must have the power to set norms as well as enforce them. i have no qualms with this claim. in fact, i agree with harel for the most part. a state without the power to enforce sanctions is tantamount to a stateless existence in many respects: it is a pseudo-state of nature. but what harel neglects to account for is an improperly functioning state. harel’s integrationist justi#cation of state sanctions does have force in the situations in which it applies, but this theory of punishment justi#cation simply does not pertain to actions in a pseudo-state of nature. vigilantism is only permissible in those circumstances where the state cannot punish e!ectively, where the state’s proper functioning has already been disrupted. in these circumstances, non-state in%icted sanctions would not strip the state of its power to punish, as harel argues,37 because the state has already lost this power some other way. "erefore, my argument for the legitimacy of vigilantism in pseudo-states of nature does not con%ict with harel’s ultimately valid integrationist justi#cation for state in%icted sanctions. while harel is unconvincing in his argument for the state’s express right to punish, he does raise some very important concerns regarding non-state-imposed sanctions, concerns that frequently appear in the discussion of vigilantism. one of the #rst objections he raises toward privately in%icted sanctions is that when a punishment is not state-imposed it loses its ties with the state-imposed laws; there is a disconnect between the law being transgressed—a law imposed by the state—and the punishment for that transgression38. in response to harel’s argument that extralegal punishment severs the link between the body enacting the laws and the individuals enforcing them, i would argue that this is true to a small degree. but most often vigilantes enforce those very same laws of the state (except in cases where the laws are evil, but this di$culty is cleared when “state” is replaced with “morality of community”). vigilantes are more than capable of enforcing the same or analogous punishments for criminal transgressions. and because the vigilante, under the speci#c paradigm laid out in section one, strives to uphold the morality of his community, he is likely to mimic state sanctions as best he can. "erefore, the vigilante is acting as a substitute for the state, enforcing the state’s laws and, in most cases, keeping to the state’s designated sanctions. 34 ibid, 130. 35 surprisingly, harel’s remarks re-enforce my classi#cation of an ill-functioning state as a pseudo-state of nature. 36 ibid. 37 ibid. 38 ibid, 114. 27issue ix ɢ spring 2022 heroes or villains however, even when a vigilante acts as a substitute for the state, he is still only human, and so subject to extreme bias. "is leads to the next problem harel mentions, the same one that locke notes in the second treatise of government: non-state in%icted punishment is highly susceptible to the whims and fancies of the individuals doling out the punishments39. extralegal punishment can quickly become excessive or too lenient, based on the interests of the punishers. furthermore, who metes out sanctions for the non-state punishers in this situation?: quis custodiet ipsos custodes? who watches the watchmen? it seems unrealistic to expect all humans to judge themselves objectively. as locke says, “[i]t is unreasonable for men to be judges in their own cases, that self-love will make men partial to themselves40.” "e di$culty of bias and human error is the basis for another problem extralegal punishment faces: privately in%icted sanctions are grounded in private judgments41. when an individual imposes punishment for any transgression—whether a state issued prohibition or a moral transgression—he is governed by his own judgments of wrongness. "is individual is also subject to his own conceptions of proper degrees of severity of punishment for any given transgression. even if the vigilante is acting as a substitute for the state and his judgments coincide with those of the state, those judgments simply are not the same as the state’s. both of these concerns are easily solved. "e question of who watches the watchman is answered through appeal to locke’s original construction of the “natural executive right.” because every individual in the (pseudo) state of nature has the right to punish all wrongdoers, any other individual can thus punish the vigilante if he should do something wrong42. if a vigilante oversteps his bounds and begins to punish indiscriminately and contrary to the morality of the community to which he belongs, he can be punished, too. in these situations, the vigilante himself has become a “wrongdoer” and can consequently be punished by another vigilante or the state, if it is functioning properly in that respect. "is proviso also helps solve the other problem—that the vigilante, as a human, is subject to his own whims and may be driven by his own sel#sh motivations to committing undeserved vengeance. together with the condition that in order for vigilante actions to be legitimate they must conform to, or at least tend toward, those actions of a maximally rational agent—the “system of vigilante checks and balances,” so to speak—greatly diminishes the risk of unjust or unwarranted punishment. it is true that no human being is a maximally rational agent, nor can any person divorce himself from his emotions and personal motives, but neither can the state be completely unbiased and totally fair. if the 39 ibid, 118. 40 locke, 9. 41 harel, 127. 42 establishing what a vigilante could do that deserves punishment is somewhat di$cult, as he is already operating outside of the con#nes of the law, so his simply breaking the law is not enough to warrant sanctions; in this case, we can again appeal to the idea of a general morality. when the vigilante transgresses the morality of the community then he can and shall be punished. 28 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college vigilante should fail to punish in a way that tends toward a maximally rational agent, slipping into vengeance and unnecessary and unnecessarily harsh punishments, then he is no longer a proper vigilante and should be subject to punishment. aside from the objections harel raises, vigilantism is often charged with several other extreme di$culties. one such di$culty is an epistemic di$culty: how can any one individual know that another individual is guilty of committing a crime? "is problem is inextricably linked with another di$culty facing vigilantism: the lack of procedural systems of justice and due process. because vigilantes do not have to abide by the legal procedures that the state must follow, it seems that there is no standard of judgment for who is guilty in such pseudo-states of nature. "is is where i disagree. it is true that a vigilante is not subject to the same rules as the state, but this does not mean he should be allowed to make rash, uninformed decisions. in fact, vigilantes should be held to a higher level of certainty of guilt precisely because they do not have to deal with procedural red tape and legal technicalities. "is is why i would like to add one last condition for legitimate vigilante actions: vigilantes must be certain of the guilt of whomever they seek to punish. "ey must have evidence or #rm knowledge that a crime has been committed. a vigilante may even follow his own procedural process, collecting evidence (both legally and illegally), interviewing witnesses, and even giving the accused a chance to confess or make a case for his innocence. "is stipulation—that a vigilante must have absolute certainty that an individual has committed some wrongdoing—solves the epistemic and procedural problems faced by vigilantism and precludes impulsive or reactionary violence as legitimate vigilante actions. furthermore, i believe that the fact that a vigilante is not held to any procedural standards before acting saves him from the trappings of a corrupt state. for it is during this practice of “due process” that corruption is most likely to occur; crucial evidence gets thrown out on technicalities, witnesses lie under oath, judge and jury are bribed or threatened to give a sentence of not guilty. "e vigilante, acting on his own and not tied to these procedural measures, is better able to assess guilt and assign punishment in a pseudo-state of nature. "ere still lies the problem of what justi#es the proclamation by the vigilante that a person is guilty. without any procedural system in place to ensure justice, what makes the vigilante’s judgment a correct one? here is where i look again to the epistemic constraints put on vigilantism. before he can act, a vigilante must know for certain that the o!ender has committed some wrong. as for what makes the vigilante’s judgment just, i turn back to the “natural executive right.” in a state of nature, or pseudo-state of nature, everyone has the right to assess and punish transgressions of the laws of nature or the mores of his community. we all have an equal right to confer judgments on others. as john simmons writes: 29issue ix ɢ spring 2022 heroes or villains neither one’s general level of virtue nor one’s talents in the area of punishment (e,g,, special aptitude for being a judge, jailer, or executioner) are normally taken to establish any special claim to be the one who should punish others43. everyone is equal in his or her right to judge others in a state, or pseudo-state, of nature. additionally, because vigilantism must coincide with the morality of a community and tend toward the actions of a maximally rational agent, the vigilante cannot simply punish what he believes is wrong but must punish what the community he represents believes is wrong. "e vigilante must punish in a way that coincides with his community’s beliefs. simmons, quoting locke, agrees: while “every man in the state of nature has a power to kill a murderer” (ii, 11), “lesser breaches” of the law of nature must be punished less severely (ii, 12). "e executive right is a right only to retribute to him, so far as calm reason and conscience dictates, what is proportionate to his transgression, which is so much as may serve for reparation and restraint44. it is here that we must remember that while a vigilante is not beholden to the state, he does not operate completely free from the state. he is not isolated from the legislation and punishments of the state but, rather, is a free entity working outside the bounds of the state in order to protect and restore that same state. "e vigilante acts outside the con#nes of a non-working state in an attempt to protect or improve the state and uphold the values of his community. vigilante actions, going back to rosenbaum and sederberg, are establishment violence, violence aimed at protecting or correcting the existing establishment. "at is why a vigilante’s judgment of wrongs, in a pseudostate of nature, is valid and can lead to the just imposition of sanctions while still being free from the state. conclusion "e goal of this paper has been to justify the highly speci#c phenomenon of crimecontrol vigilantism in a lockean pseudo-state of nature. ultimately, i hope to have proven that “crime-control vigilantism” is a legitimate and just recourse when the state has failed to e!ectively ful#ll its functions because of john locke’s conception of the “natural executive right” applied in “pseudo-states of nature.” my goal was to give credence to our intuitions of vigilantes as good guys, heroes, or even superheroes, while #nding a proper foundation for extralegal punishment. i believe that locke’s “natural executive right,” the individual’s natural right to punish, applied in a pseudo-state of nature, a situation in which the state has failed in some crucial aspect 43 simmins, 312. 44 idid, 318. 30 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college but exists in all other aspects, presents a solid philosophical justi#cation for “crimecontrol vigilantism.” references abrahams, r. g. vigilant citizens: vigilantism and the state. malden, mass.: polity, 1998. bearak, barry. "watching the murder of an innocent man." !e new york times, june 2, 2011. buss, sarah, "personal autonomy." in !e stanford encyclopedia of philosophy (fall 2008). edited by edward n. zalta. http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2008/entries/personal-autonomy/ dumsday, travis. "on cheering charles bronson: "e ethics of vigilantism." in !e southern journal of philosophy xl, no. vii (2009): 49-67. harel, alon. "why only the state may in%ict criminal sanctions: "e case against privately in%icted sanctions." in legal !eory 14 (2008): 113-33. johnston, les. "what is vigilantism?" in british journal of criminology 36, no. 2 (1996): 220-35. lafave, wayne r. "self defense." in criminal law 4th ed. st. paul: "omson/ west. 539-50. 2003. locke, john. !e second treatise of government, 1689. reprint, new york: "e liberal arts press. 1956. murphy, je!rie. "a paradox in locke's "eory of natural rights." in dialogue 8 (1969): 256-71. pojman, louis p. "a critique of ethical relativism ." in ethical !eory: classical and contemporary readings. edited by louis p. pojman and james fieser. 6th ed. belmont: wadsworth, cengage learning. 43-56. 2011. rosenbaum, jon, and peter sederberg. "vigilantism: an analysis of establishment violence." in vigilante politics. philadelphia: university of pennsylvania press. 3-29. 1976. sederberg, peter, and jon rosenbaum. "vigilante politics: concluding observations." in vigilante politics. philadelphia: university of pennsylvania press. 261-73. 1976. 31issue ix ɢ spring 2022 heroes or villains shotland, r. lance, and lynne i. goodstein. ""e role of bystanders in crime control." in journal of social issues 40, no. 1 (1984): 9-26. simmons, a. john. ""e right to punish." in !e lockean !eory of rights. princeton, n.j.: princeton university press. 121-66. 1992. tuckness, alex, "locke's political philosophy." in !e stanford encyclopedia of philosophy (spring 2016 edition). edited by edward n. zalta. http://plato. stanford.edu/archives/spr2016/entries/locke-political 57issue x ◆ spring 2023 an analysis of the overlooked value of greatness δι ά νο ια an analysis of the overlooked value of greatness brandon beesley introduction greatness is a concept ubiquitous throughout human history; amorphous, unde!ned, yet tauntingly and irresistibly alluring.1 humanity’s interest in achievement is demonstrated by philosophy’s many attempts at distilling the concept, with concessions ranging from aristotle’s virtue-oriented megalopsychos to nietzsche’s power-hungry übermensch. "ese two dichotomously opposed !gures (the megalopsychos and übermensch) both, in the minds of the philosophers who created them, embody human greatness. contextualized by the obsessive, overwhelming, and often anxiety-inducing human aspiration to greatness, the dissimilarities between them become somewhat disconcerting, and we must ask: what exactly is greatness? "is essay aims to shed additional light on this question from the space between prevalent philosophical interpretations of greatness. generally, it seems that attempts to de!ne greatness !t within one of two categories. "e !rst of these prioritizes a link to virtue and morality, while the second understands power to be the measure of greatness. aristotle, plato, and saint "omas aquinas understand greatness in terms of virtue, while nietzsche and certain feminist philosophers understand it to emerge out of an exercise of power. essentially, the virtue-oriented thinkers purport that greatness is achieved by a life of virtuous acts conducive to happiness and honor. megalopsychia is “a sort of crown of 1 i would like to thank dr. nate whelan-jackson and dr. e. wray bryant for their support and suggestions on the many versions of this work. 58 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college the virtues; for it makes them greater, and it is not found without them.”2 adversely, with a conspicuous disdain for the “whole virtuous dirtiness” of the !rst category, nietzsche’s will to power purports that the concept of greatness is intrinsically linked to personal power.3 valuing only the conquering of obstacles and expansion of strength, status, wealth, and in#uence, the übermensch is an eagle amongst lambs, yielding only to its own will to power. is greatness in 'power!to' or 'power!over'? nietzsche’s de!nition of power that prioritizes strength and force, however, is challenged by certain feminist perspectives on power. amy allen, for instance, notes the predominantly masculine and oppressive form of power, described by robert dahl, as a scenario in which “[person] a has power over [person] b to the extent that he can get b to do something that b would not otherwise do,” has come to be known as the ‘power-over’ understanding of power.4 "is understanding of power is similar to nietzsche’s philosophy: it values physical strength, in#uence, and social status. historically, the mistreatment of women has led to the interpretation of this notion of power as a tool of the patriarchy. "e feminist perspective, in an attempt to remediate this oppressive and misogynistic concept, has instead promoted conceptions of power that empowerment of action – ‘power-to’ rather than ‘power-over.’ a ‘power-to’ perspective focuses on a more positive relationship with others, noting facets of power as the ability to empower and inspire transformation in oneself and others; put simply, it is the ability to enact change. "is perspective places few, if any, restrictions who can potentially be counted among the powerful. as johanna oksala notes, women have impacted immeasurable change, even when consigned to the roles of mothers and caretakers, through the upbringing and nurturing of others.5 she further summarizes the feminist response to power, “in other words, the fact that women are often reluctant to take or exercise power over others does not indicate that women have a problem; it indicates that there is a problem with our understanding of power, as well as in our relationships with each other in patriarchal societies,” a problem the ‘power-to’ concept attempts to remediate.6 2 understood as ‘greatness of soul’;$aristotle, nicomachean ethics, 7.3. 3 friedrich nietzsche, "e antichrist, translated by h. l. mencken. binghamton (ny: vail-ballou press, 1924): 21. 4 amy allen, “feminist perspectives on power,” "e stanford encyclopedia of philosophy (fall 2022 edition): 1. 5 johanna oksala, “feminism and power,” "e routledge companion to feminist philosophy, (2017): 680. 6 oksala, “feminism and power,” 681. 59issue x ◆ spring 2023 an analysis of the overlooked value of greatness greatness and its value as power: a feminist perspective "e feminist perspective, with a de!nition of power vastly di%erent than nietzsche’s, still supports the idea that greatness is reliant upon the expression of power. an excellent example of speci!c feminine greatness is discussed in alison booth’s greatness engendered: george eliot and virginia woolf, in which booth discusses the in#uence the two authors held over their patriarchal victorian-era society, exemplifying ‘power-to’ through literature. booth suggests their greatness results from their persuasiveness; their ability to describe through their writing a society of inclusion and progress elicited reactions from readers that broke the strongly enforced gender roles of the late 19th century. persuasion, of course, is an expression of ‘power-to,’ speci!cally power to in#uence others and incite change. woolf and eliot displayed a visceral expression of power through their persuasive literature, an achievement magni!ed by the oppressive, damaging gender norms to which they were constrained. t. s. elliot even “a&rms that woolf became ‘the centre . . . of the literary life of london,’ ‘the symbol’ of the ‘victorian upper middleclass’ cultural tradition,” despite her womanhood being a social disadvantage.7 "eir ability to in#uence their readership with notions of “a shared, progressive life beyond individuality” is certainly reason to deem these two authors great wordsmiths, and while the ability to persuade and in#uence is an important component of the feminist assessment of greatness, it is not the only one.8 equally as important to the concept is the predominantly feminist ethic of care. care and power "is ethic of care is not exactly the naive, benevolent depiction the connotation of ‘care’ may evoke. virginia held addresses the presence of violence, particularly against women, and how the ethics of care has been designed to handle such stark possibilities. rather than negatively attempting to suppress or harm those who may be violent, the ethic of care searches for a more positive, peaceful resolution. “within practices of care, as we have seen, rights should be recognized, including rights to peace and security of the [violent] person. force may sometimes be needed to assure respect for such rights. "is does not mean that the background of care can be forgotten.”9 "is ‘background of care’ and, in fact, the general term ‘care,’ has been given various de!nitions by numerous thinkers; joan tronto focuses on the work of caring for someone, and nel noddings on the attitude with which one is willing to care. 7 alison booth, greatness engendered: george eliot and virginia booth (ny: cornell university press, 1992), 1. 8 booth, greatness engendered: george eliot and virginia booth, 6. 9 virginia held, "e ethics of care: personal, political, and global (ny: oxford university press, 2006), 139. 60 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college after sifting through the many o%ered de!nitions, held provides and seems to prioritize the de!nition o%ered by diemut bubeck, who believes “caring for is the meeting of the needs of one person by another person, where face-to-face interaction between carer and cared-for is a crucial element of the overall activity and where the need is of such a nature that it cannot possibly be met by the person in need herself.”10 bubeck’s de!nition simultaneously separates care from being a service for one capable to complete an act themselves, and allows care to be universally o%ered without a prerequisite of emotional attachment. however, there are, at risk of dramatization, fatal #aws in bubeck’s contender that desecrate its validity in held’s eyes. she notes that bubeck does not pay mind to the intent of the caregiver; a nurse may utterly hate a patient, wishing them death, but still o%er them services. is this truly care? bubeck says yes; held is less certain. she adjusts the original de!nition to form her own: care is both a practice and a value…it shows us how to respond to needs and why we should. it builds trust and mutual concern and connectedness between persons….along with its appropriate attitudes…practices of care should express the caring relations that bring persons together, and they should do so in ways that are progressively more morally satisfactory. caring practices should gradually transform children and others into human beings who are increasingly morally admirable…in addition to being a practice, care is also a value. caring persons and caring attitudes should be valued… we can ask if persons are attentive and responsive to each other’s needs or indi%erent and self-absorbed. care is…more the characterization of a social relation than the description of an individual disposition, and social relations are not reducible to individual states.11 held’s description of care recti!es the #aws found in bubeck’s de!nition while maintaining the universality and distinctiveness of acts of service originally proposed. care plays an important role in the feminist assessment of greatness, as it is through care that empowerment and in#uence must be a%ected. while moral value seems to permeate this understanding of care and empowerment, it is important to recognize that the feminist analysis of greatness credits the power, the ability to in#uence positive change as the variable pertinent to greatness, rather than the morality intrinsically present in care and empowerment. "e ethics of care certainly !t into the feminist perspective of ‘power-to’ as a necessary condition for empowerment, which in turn leads to the !nal value of greatness– per this assessment, that is the power to incite change. interestingly, these characteristics–care, empowerment, and social progressiveness– seem to be the antithesis of the nietzschean power characteristics of wealth, status, and strength. however, despite their di%erences in understanding 10 held, "e ethics of care: personal, political, and global, 139. 11 held, "e ethics of care: personal, political, and global, 42. 61issue x ◆ spring 2023 an analysis of the overlooked value of greatness of the term, both the feminist perspective and nietzsche contend that expression of power is the ultimate value of greatness. power? or virtue? now that the proponents for each set have been introduced, and their arguments described, who do we believe? is the reason humanity strives for greatness tied to morality and virtue? or is greatness simply an expression of human power, with no tie to morality? it seems evident that the much more likely and correct answer is a third option; morality and power are both required to achieve greatness. more speci!cally, expressions of power that are consistent with morality and exhibit virtue are the only actions that mirror the characteristic of greatness. analyses of the reasoning provided by both the virtue-centric and power-centric proponents will now be conducted in order to determine the validity of each–are they self-su&cient and satisfactory? or do they support this essay’s contention? an analysis of 'power-over' greatness nietzsche’s argument against the idea of virtue as having any role in the value of greatness, and thus his argument against this paper’s contention, are quite unconvincing. he asserts that the achievement of great acts, through all the pain and su%ering they bring, grows personal power in accordance with the innate will to power living beings experience; this growth of power is the ultimate good along with the expression of personal power over opposition. in this view, either power-over is a su&cient condition for greatness, meaning those with power have a correlated claim to greatness, or that power is a necessary condition for greatness, meaning that if one is great one must possess power. both of these logical avenues struggle in defending nietzsche’s contentions. firstly, let’s assess power-over as a su&cient condition for greatness. "e existence of tyrants and oppressive power, the likes of hitler and stalin, discredit this avenue for (what should be) an overwhelming majority. "e power and in#uence these two men speci!cally possessed was immense, yet without morality to guide them, such power lent itself to atrocities rather than greatness. "eir growth in power did not ultimately lead them to happiness, rather, their thirst for power and conquest was insatiable and unsatisfying. "ese two tyrants exemplify the übermensch, possessing power, in#uence, strength, and wealth. yet they are lacking the result expected from this nietzschean equation: greatness of character is certainly not associated with these dictators. "us, nietzschean power is not a su&cient condition for greatness. "e conclusion that strength, in#uence, and, in general, ‘power-over’ is not necessary for greatness rests upon the assumption mentioned in the introduction–humanity is able to intuitively identify greatness of character. without this assumption, a 62 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college ridiculous conclusion and counter may conceivably be o%ered by the !ercest and most adamant subscribers of nietzschean philosophy: that such horri!c tyrants are great. in this context, the assumption that those engaging with this discussion are reasonable enough to denounce vehemently this conclusion is necessary, and benign to the analysis. however, nietzsche’s philosophy does play a supportive role in the concept of greatness and its value this discussion proposes. although certainly not su&cient, it seems to be the case that power is instead a necessary condition for greatness. if this is indeed the case, no examples of greatness without power exist. in this aspect, nietzsche appears to be somewhat correct. harriet tubman’s incredible life provides an equally inspiring and fascinating example to explore through a nietzschean lens. tubman embodies the opposite of the aforementioned übermensch and tyrants: a woman widely (and rightly) regarded as great (again, relying on the precursory assumption), who had little, if any, social power. as an escaped slave, she possessed no in#uence, no wealth, and no particular physical strength. as the victim of a head injury that left her susceptible to seizures, blurred vision, and headaches, it seems quite the opposite was true.12 despite having no resemblance to the typically described übermensch, tubman does, in fact, demonstrate a will to power. tubman’s will was not expressed in grandiose displays of power or in#uence, rather, it was expressed both in her daring escape from slavery and through the thirteen acts that earned her a place amongst the great; the thirteen sel#ess and daunting journeys that delivered emancipation to over seventy people. simply, tubman willed to free herself and others, and enacted that will through her power. defying the racial oppression–perhaps more appropriately, the racially motivated abuse–she and countless others were subjected to, tubman’s story exempli!es the human desire to “overcome the world” against them that nietzsche describes.13 tubman’s story, although certainly incredible, is just one example of power’s intricate relationship with greatness. syntactically, each choice demonstrates an expression of power (the power to choose one outcome or another). agential actions require the choice to act. great acts that elucidate greatness of character must be agential.14 12 harriet tubman byway, “about harriet tubman.” accessed july 23, 2022, harriettubmanbyway.or g/harriettubman/#about. 13 friedrich nietzsche, "e will to power. edited by walter a. kaufmann and r. j. hollingdale, translated by walter a. kaufmann. (ny: random house, 1968), 182. 14 (c) serves as a defense against technicality. if one is theoretically forced to do a great action against their will, the action does not elucidate greatness of its actor’s character, and is thus out of this discussion’s intended scope. 63issue x ◆ spring 2023 an analysis of the overlooked value of greatness "erefore, great actions (actions denoting greatness of character) must be a result of power. in this notation, power is necessary for greatness. however, since power is not su&cient for greatness, as we deduced earlier, then a second characteristic in cooperation with power must also be responsible for greatness. "is second characteristic reveals itself to be morality, as tubman’s life exempli!es. along with expressing her will to power against an oppressive society, the morality tubman’s actions displayed was perhaps equally, if not more, responsible in warranting her the recognition of greatness. "e actions through which she expressed virtue were plentiful, as her thirteen journeys liberating slaves through the underground railroad were simply precursors to her serv[ing] as a spy and scout; provid[ing] extensive assistance to soldiers including nursing, cooking, and laundering, and even help[ing] lead a major attack on confederate property called the combahee river raid…yield[ing] new union enlistments and over 700 “contrabands” (freed slaves).15 "ese heroic and sel#ess expressions of will exempli!ed courage, ambition, sel#essness, and certainly several other virtues– all of which elucidated the greatness of her character. while nietzsche’s argument of the will to power is unsatisfactory as a su&cient condition of greatness, harriet tubman’s life demonstrates its conceivable role as a necessary condition illuminates the !rst evidence of this essay’s contention– greatness’ value lies in the crossroads of expressing power and morality. an analysis of 'power-to' greatness to further support the argument that both power and virtue play a role in greatness and its value, we will once again use the su&cient and necessary logical avenues to analyze the validity of the ‘power-to’ argument o%ered by the feminist perspective, which states that displays of greatness–de!ned as acts that empower and in#uence change through ethics of care–are valuable in the social change they e%ect. again, either ‘power-to’ is a su&cient condition, suggesting that no ‘power-to’ is expressed without greatness, or it is a necessary condition, meaning no greatness is evident without the expression of ‘power-to.’ "e ultimate value prescribed by the feminist perspective of ‘power-to,’ and thus greatness, is the instigation of social change. "is expression of power as it is understood by the feminist perspective, upon logical analysis, appears to contain variables necessary for greatness but o%ers none su&cient for greatness. while many examples of vicious leaders lacking the distinction of 15 lasch-quinn, elisabeth. “harriet tubman: an american idol,” "e journal of blacks in higher education, no. 43, (spring 2004):124, jstor.org/stable/4133571. 64 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college greatness certainly possessed and demonstrated characteristics of the feminist assessment, speci!cally in#uence, the morality required for care and empowerment seems to be the !lter such tyrants and dictators cannot percolate. hitler, for example, achieved immense in#uence over germany through his oration. daniel binchy recalls listening to him speak at a meeting that took place in 1921, at the university of munich. “here was a born natural orator,” he describes, “he began slowly, almost hesitatingly, stumbling over the construction of his sentences, correcting his dialect pronunciation. "en all at once he seemed to take !re. his voice rose victorious over falterings, his eyes blazed with conviction, his whole body became an instrument of rude eloquence.”16 "e speech ends with a response from the audience, “a scene of hysterical enthusiasm which ba'es description,” binchy recalls.17 "e captivation hitler commanded over a listening audience demonstrates a similar degree of persuasiveness that woolf and eliot possessed through their literature. unlike these two great authors, however, hitler used this persuasion to persecute, oppress, and breed hatred, rather than empower positive social change. he did, however, empower himself. allen’s understanding of held’s concept of ‘power-to’ clari!es that the “capacity to transform and empower oneself ” is compliant with the sickening expression of power hitler demonstrated.18 "rough propaganda, manipulation, and fear, hitler empowered himself and his political party, posing as a moral crusader while victimizing millions throughout his cynical rampage.19 while he was undeniably lacking care as described by held, the evidence that such a terrible man displayed both empowerment and in#uence characterizes where this assessment of power is subject to dispute and provides evidence against ‘power-to’ as a su&cient condition for greatness. it appears that without morality, the abilities of empowerment, in#uence, and ultimately, the means to produce societal change, do not warrant the distinction of greatness. "e unique aspect of care, though, and the virtue intrinsically woven within care undoubtedly !t into our concept of power with virtue. care certainly demonstrates characteristics representative of the expression of will; an enactment of personal power. held notes that “an important aspect of care is how it expresses our attitudes and relationships,” meaning that the intentions of a caregiver must match their actions to be genuine care.20 "is acting upon one’s desire is compatible with the nietzschean concept of will to power; the caregiver expresses their personal power, (i.e. ability to care) in response to their will (i.e. their desire to care). while they may not necessarily be facing the social opposition nietzsche posits, they are certainly 16 daniel a. binchy, “adolf hitler,” studies: an irish quarterly review 22, no. 85 (march 1933): 1, jstor.org/ stable/30094970. 17 binchy, adolf hitler, 2. 18 allen, feminist perspectives on power, 4. 19 richard weikart, hitler’s ethics: "e nazi pursuit of evolutionary progress, (ny: palgrave macmillan, 2009), 17. 20 held, "e ethics of care: personal, political, and global, 33. 65issue x ◆ spring 2023 an analysis of the overlooked value of greatness attempting to overcome an obstacle; they are attempting to alleviate whatever the cared-for may be facing, an obstacle that, through relationship, becomes personal. while the feminist perspective is unsatisfactory alone in its assessment of greatness, the understanding of care as the expression of one’s will and power, partnered with the intrinsic morality present in care, appears to further support the conclusion that both power and virtue are essential in greatness and its value. the virtue!centric contention plato, aristotle, and saint aquinas each believe that greatness and its value are closely related and dependent upon moral standards and displays of virtue. aristotle particularly argues that greatness of soul, megalopsychia, is a crown that indicates the metaphorical wearer as one who possesses and appropriately practices each virtue. greatness, as argued by these essentially eudaemonistic philosophers, holds value as the practice of virtue required for greatness is also the path to happiness. similarly, great acts are valuable in that they reveal greatness of character. contrary to the aristotelian theory of unity, which unconvincingly describes that one cannot possess a single virtue if they do not possess all of them, –a theory that has been discredited by numerous scholars– it appears that greatness does not require the display of each virtue. referring again to the moon landing, the undeniable act of greatness certainly lacked some of the twelve virtues aristotle notes–humorous wit was likely not a large factor in the endeavor–but appropriate temperance, courage, ambition, and liberality undeniably were.21 "e appropriate practice of these four virtues required to complete the mission still demonstrated the greatness of character the astronauts on board possessed, and further, seem to entail a correlation with honor. as virtuous actions are valued by and rewarded with honor, the more virtues represented in an action, the more honor and greatness they seem to elicit. while greatness may not require every virtue, it is important to note that great acts must always be compatible with morality and all twelve virtues. for example, one may harbor ambition for an act of evil that directly opposes friendliness or justice. ambition, one of the twelve virtues, does not make this potential act great; the lack of morality necessary for compatibility with virtue transforms ambition from a virtue into a vice. acts of greatness, then, must show compatibility with the twelve virtues while demonstrating an appropriate practice of at least one virtue worth honoring.22 an analysis of this argument, as stated, will reveal whether virtue and morality are necessary, su&cient, or both in regard to achieving greatness. 21 "e twelve virtues being courage, temperance, liberality, magnanimity, ambition, patience, truthfulness, wittiness, friendliness, modesty, and righteous indignation (justice), via w. f. demoss. 22 w.f. demoss, “spenser’s twelve moral virtues: according to aristotle,” modern philology 16, no. 1 (may 1918): 25, jstor.org/stable/433028; aristotle, nicomachean ethics, 2.7. 66 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college it appears that a display of virtue that is morally compatible with each virtue is necessary for acts of greatness. an action incompatible with virtue–an action incompatible with justice, friendliness, or truthfulness– simply fails to be great. for example, winning an olympic gold medal for one’s country certainly seems like a great action. by saint aquinas’ de!nition that explains “one mak[ing] a very good use of [an item or action]” is proportional greatness, it certainly is.23as such, any athlete capable of this feat inarguably demonstrates ambition, courage, temperance, and many other virtues both in their training and performance. such an achievement is great unless of course, the athlete was cheating. using banned performance enhancers, for instance, is incompatible with the virtues of justice and truthfulness– the action is both unfair to the other competitors and is untruthful of the athlete, and thus, fails to be great. "e incompatibility of the twelve virtues perverts what would be an honorable and great action into a dishonorable act. it is the only aspect of this athlete’s conduct that excludes them from the designation of greatness. "is particular distinction between moral compatibility and incompatibility demonstrates quite well the necessity of morality: an action that would, by all other accounts, be great, marred by an act incompatible with virtue, fails to be great. logically, then, virtue compatibility is necessary for great achievement. additionally, excellent displays of virtue seem to be a requirement for greatness; an act is not great simply because they are compatible with virtue, it must display something worthy of honor. which, as previously discussed, excellent demonstrations of virtue are worthy of honor. with a simple example, we have demonstrated the necessary roles of both virtue compatibility and displaying virtue in the achievement of great acts, through which greatness of character is represented. power led by virtue when determining whether demonstrations of honorable virtue and virtue compatibility are su&cient for greatness, a dilemma requiring further attention appears. our conclusion, upon logical analyses of both nietzsche’s and the feminist perspective’s arguments, revealed the false dichotomy between the virtue and power assessments of greatness; both power and virtue seem necessary for greatness. when taken as two separate variables, virtue could not, then, be a su&cient condition, as the presence of an expression of power is required to achieve greatness. however, a di%erent perspective reveals that they are not distinct variables, rather, expressions of power and morality are so closely intertwined that the two variables act as one– through one’s will and expression of personal power, virtues signifying greatness may be performed. 23 aquinas, summa "eologica, 2.2.129. 67issue x ◆ spring 2023 an analysis of the overlooked value of greatness an important aspect of virtue ethics as aristotle describes them is the intention behind an action. he explains that we, as humans, deliberate amongst ourselves over choices we can control, including both virtue and vice. whether one expresses virtuous acts depends, for the most part, upon their own choice and internal deliberation. aristotle describes this ability by explaining, “for where it is in our power to act it is also in our power not to act, and vice versa; so that, if to act, where this is noble, is in our power, not to act, which will be base, will also be in our power, and if not to act, where this is noble, is in our power, to act, which will be base, will also be in our power;” our personal will, most often decided upon by our reasoning, determine whether we express virtues or ‘base’ actions in any given scenario.24 "is description of internal con#ict and expressions of power seems quite reminiscent of the nietzschean description of a being’s expression of their will to power, as well as the ‘power-to’ contention; indulging one’s will in an expression of power based solely on their whims and the ability to act upon one’s choice and in#uence change. “how does one become stronger?” nietzsche asks before answering, “by coming to decisions slowly; and by clinging tenaciously to what one has decided.”25 "e permeating undertones of intention and choice are not unique to aristotle and nietzsche, as evidenced by the feminist contention. "e opposite distinction of power also understands choice as a crucial element, a power even described by sarah lucia hoagland as “power of ability, of choice and engagement.”26 "e presence of deliberation and decision followed by the expression of power required to enact that decision in will to power, a ‘power-to’ approach, and nicomachean ethics supports the conclusion that both power and virtue are required for greatness. saint aquinas strengthens this notion, stating “"e word ‘choice’ implies something belonging to the reason or intellect, and something belonging to the will…choice is substantially not an act of the reason but of the will… of the appetitive power” within us.27 one must possess the will and power required to choose and act upon their decision to display virtue, thus displays of virtue are intrinsically woven with an expression of power.28 rather than interpreting these as separate variables, it seems that, due to their inseparable nature, the more appropriate route would be to conclude that power is an essential part of the practice 24 aristotle, nicomachean ethics 3.5; base meaning ‘lowly, ine&cient.’ via rose cherubin. “ancient greek vocabulary: aristotle.” accessed july 4, 2022, mason.gmu.edu/~rcherubi/arvoc.htm. 25 nietzsche, will to power, 486. 26 sarah hoagland, lesbian ethics: towards new value (ca: institute of lesbian studies, 1988), 118. 27 aquinas, summa "eologica, 2.1.13. 28 we have discovered here that choice is an integral part of greatness. as an expression of one’s will or power, it is the link between power and virtue. without choice, a distinction of ‘greatness’ is neither important nor honorable for the one receiving it: they did not accomplish anything worthy of the distinction! only because there is a possibility not to be virtuous or moral is such an act honorable and great. of course, this relies upon the belief that human free will is a reality. without such a belief, human greatness (as is human evil, or any other human characteristic) is a falsity. discussions on this topic (free will) can be found in aquinas, augustine, bonaventure, slote 1980. 68 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college of virtues. "erefore, the expression of virtues, through acts compatible with every virtue, is su&cient for the acts of greatness required in the demonstration of greatness of character. conclusion in our attempt to construct a clearer understanding of greatness, the concepts once held to be diametrically opposed have become amalgam, enmeshed by the shared aspect of choice. it does not appear, through our analysis, that power alone is su&cient for a claim to greatness: as stand-alone contentions, both the nietzschean and feminist perspectives of power encounter rather problematic implications that are incompatible with the notion of human excellence.29 nietzsche’s perspective, termed ‘power-over,’ accommodates tyranny, oppression, and systemic violence in a concept of human excellence—a conclusion we must vehemently refute. while the progressive notion of ‘power-to’ as o%ered by the feminist perspective is an alternative account that resists the historically marginalizing patriarchal tones of ‘power-over,’ it too falls victim to similar unacceptable implications. recounts of hitler’s in#uence, persuasion, and vicious self-empowerment re#ect rather eerily the pillars upon which a ‘power-to’ perspective lies. "e apparent ‘saving grace’ of these power-centric concepts of greatness seems to be the necessary infusion of virtue, whether purely aristotelian or mediated by held’s ethic of care. "is formulation immediately excludes the preposterous notion of tyrants qualifying as great and adds to greatness a value as conducive to happiness and honor (in proportion to the virtue displayed). "e example of the dishonest olympian demonstrates the necessity of virtue for greatness; actions normally worthy of honor, marred by an act incompatible with morality, simply fail to demonstrate greatness. additionally, harriet tubman’s incredible life exempli!es the integral role of personal power (speci!cally, the personal power to choose) in expressing virtue, a notion which is supported by both the virtue-centric and powercentric perspectives. "us, it appears that what began as two seemingly dichotomous understandings of greatness have emerged from our analysis as one, with virtue acting as a link between power (choice) and human greatness. 29 people seem to be capable of identifying greatness of character, albeit without necessarily articulating what characteristic is being recognized. simply, people can discern a !gure as great without understanding why that !gure is great. "is notion can be more familiarly described by (imperfectly but e%ectively) analogizing the assumption that people are able to identify pieces of art as art, without having a distinct or articulable notion of what makes such a piece art–asking someone to describe the distinct characteristics that denote both anish kapoor’s cloud gate and andy warhol’s brillo box as art may prove this point. 69issue x ◆ spring 2023 an analysis of the overlooked value of greatness references allen, amy. “feminist perspectives on power,” "e stanford encyclopedia of philosophy, (fall 2022 edition): 1, plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2022/entries/ feminist-power/. binchy, daniel a. “adolf hitler,” studies: an irish quarterly review 22, no. 85 (march 1933): 29-47, jstor.org/ stable/30094970. booth, alison. greatness engendered: george eliot and virginia booth. ny: cornell university press, 1992. demoss, w. f. “spenser’s twelve moral virtues: according to aristotle,” modern philology 16, no. 1 (may 1918): 23-38, jstor.org/stable/433028. harriet tubman byway. “about harriet tubman.” accessed july 23, 2022, harriettubmanbyway.org/harr iet-tubman/#about. held, virginia. "e ethics of care: personal, political, and global. ny: oxford university press, 2006. hoagland, sarah. lesbian ethics: towards new value. ca: institute of lesbian studies, 1988. lasch-quinn, elisabeth. “harriet tubman: an american idol,” "e journal of blacks in higher education, no. 43, (spring 2004):124-129, jstor.org/stable/4133571. nietzsche, friedrich. "e antichrist. translated by h. l. mencken. binghamton, ny: vail-ballou press, 1924, books.googleusercontent.com/books/content. nietzsche, friedrich. "e will to power. edited by walter a. kaufmann and r. j. hollingdale, translated by walter a. kaufmann. ny: random house, 1968. oksala, johanna.“feminism and power,” "e routledge companion to feminist philosophy, no. 1 (september 2019): 678-688, doi.org/10.4324/9781315758152. shapiro, gary. “nietzsche’s gra&to: a reading of "e antichrist.” boundary 2, vol. 9 (1981): 119–40. doi.org/10.2307/303116. weikart, richard. hitler’s ethics: "e nazi pursuit of evolutionary progress. ny: palgrave macmillan, 2009. 56 δι αν οι α preserving human freedom: aquinas on divine transcendence and creaturely contingency kelly janakiefski i. introduction thomas aquinas, in his thoroughly catholic philosophical and theological system, was committed to each of the following principles: that god foreknows all events, even future contingents; that god causes the being of all things, even contingent effects; and that the creatures he creates act contingently in accordance with their free will. on this formulation, the problem almost jumps off the page. how could it possibly be true that creatures may act contingently—that is, act in a way that is not predetermined and not necessary—if god knows what they will do before they do it and, in fact, causes them to actually do it? what kind of free will would that be? and yet, aquinas insists that divine foreknowledge and divine causation are compatible with creaturely contingency. unlike many suggestions offered in support of the so-called “compatibilist” view, aquinas does not attempt to weaken any of the above principles. he holds that god’s omniscience truly requires him to know all past, present, and future events, both necessary and contingent; that god’s role as first cause does in fact involve giving being to all things, even effects contingent upon free-choice acts; and that the free will of creatures actually involves the ability of the will to freely choose one apparent good over another equally possible alternative. so what satisfactory solution could possibly be offered for the reconciliation of these seemingly contradictory principles? although many philosophers try to deal with this issue as just one problem, here 57issue iv f spring 2017 preserving human freedom i will follow harm goris in suggesting that aquinas parses the problem into two separate, albeit related, questions, providing one solution for the problem of god’s foreknowledge, and another for the problem of god’s causality. goris calls these the solutions to temporal fatalism and causal determinism, respectively.1 ultimately, the answer to both lies in the utterly transcendent nature of god, who knows and causes in a way fundamentally different from his creatures. ii. context: clarifying the problem aquinas identifies the two relevant problems arising from god’s relationship to contingency early on in his career, as evidenced in his commentary on lombard’s sentences: “for contingencies seem to elude divine knowledge for two reasons. first, because of the order of cause to what is caused. for the effect of a necessary and immutable cause seems to be necessary; therefore, as god’s knowledge is the cause of things and as it is immutable, it does not seem that it can be of contingencies. second, because of the order of knowledge to what is known; for, as knowledge is certain cognition, it requires from the notion of certainty, even if causality is excluded, certainty and determination in what is known and contingency excludes that.”2 in other words, god’s knowledge seems to be incompatible with the existence of contingents for two reasons. first, the irresistible efficacy of god’s unchanging will means that effects must necessarily be as he causes them to be, and this kind of necessity seems to preclude contingency. since god gives being to all things, including every secondary cause and its effect, we might conclude that no cause or effect can be contingent. and second, god’s perfect knowledge requires that the object of his knowledge be certain, and this certainty seems to preclude contingency. given that god knows all events, including those in the future, we might conclude again that no event is contingent. thus it would seem that the nature of god is in fact incompatible with contingency. but aquinas certainly thinks otherwise; on the subject of free choice, he concludes that “particular actions are contingent matters, and so with respect to them the judgment of reason is related to different alternatives and is not determined to just one. accordingly, by the very fact that he is rational, man must have free choice.”3 and thus arises the problem of reconciling god’s acts of foreknowledge and causation to contingency. 1 harm goris, “divine foreknowledge, providence, predestination, and human freedom,” in the theology of thomas aquinas, rik van nieuwenhove et al., eds. (notre dame: university of notre dame press, 2010), p. 99-122. 2 aquinas, sentences, i ds 38 1.5, quoted in harm goris, free creatures of an eternal god (nijmegan: thomas instituut te utrecht, 1997), p. 55. 3 aquinas, summa theologiae, trans. alfred freddoso, i 83.1. all subsequent quotations from the summa theologiae are taken from the freddoso translation. 58 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college before diving into aquinas’ solutions, however, it will be helpful to consider the framework he sets up for discussing theological questions of this kind. aquinas generally takes the approach of negative theology, claiming that “in the case of god we cannot know his real definition, but can only know what he is not…by excluding from god certain things that do not befit him, e.g. composition, change and other things of this sort, it is possible to show what his mode of being is not.”4 for the purposes of this discussion, two very important points emerge. first, from the fact that there is no composition in god of any kind, aquinas finds him to be absolutely simple.5 although in the following discussion i will deal separately at times with god’s knowledge and his will, divine simplicity demands that we recognize these to be one and the same as they exist in god. second, from the fact that god is unchanging and immutable, aquinas finds that god “is his own eternity,” such that he exists timelessly in “the simultaneously whole and complete possession of interminable life.”6 god’s timelessness, as we will see, has important implications for the question of god’s foreknowledge – for if god exists outside of time, his “fore” knowledge will necessarily look rather different than the way in which foreknowledge is normally conceived. the previous considerations were conclusions arising from aquinas’ pursuit of negative theology, or what can be said not to be true about god. but if we want to say positive things about god, by ascribing appropriate names or perfections to him, different rules are at work. most importantly, we must keep in mind god’s transcendence. accordingly, aquinas writes that the names of god “signify the divine substance, but in an imperfect manner” and argues that “these names must be said of god and creatures in an analogous sense.”7 in other words, there is a fundamental divide between the nature of god and the nature of his creatures, one that our language may approximate but can never fully accommodate. for our purposes, it is important to keep in mind the inevitable problems that will arise in our discussion of divine foreknowledge and divine causation, always remembering that we are trying to use human language to talk about a mode of being “that elude[s] our grasp.”8 iii. solution to temporal fatalism with these considerations in mind, i will now turn to aquinas’ solution for the problem which arises from the necessity seemingly imposed by god’s foreknowledge. in answering the question “does god have knowledge of future contingents?” aquinas points out that a contingent thing may be thought of in two different ways: in itself, or in its cause. with regard to the latter, a contingent effect as it exists in its cause is indeterminate, such that it is open to both opposites; for example, before 4 st i 3 prologue 5 st i 3.7 6 st i 10.1, 2 7 st i 13.2, 5 8 harm goris, “divine foreknowledge,” p. 115. 59issue iv f spring 2017 preserving human freedom he makes up his mind, socrates is free either to sit or not to sit. but with regard to the former, a contingent effect may be thought of in itself as already actual, and present to one’s sight; thus socrates was free to choose whether to sit or not to sit, but once he actually is sitting, his act of sitting is certain. that is to say, when a contingent effect actually occurs, it can at that point be a certain object of knowledge. now god knows all things through their causes, by which he knows them as either contingent or necessary (more on this in the next section). but he also knows them in themselves, “for his cognition, like his esse, is measured by eternity…his gaze extends from eternity to all things as they exist in their presentness.”9 as such, we might say that god knows a future contingent to be contingent, insofar as he knows its cause; to be future, insofar as he knows its temporal aspect; and to be certain, insofar as it is timelessly present to him. from this, it is clear that god, as he exists timelessly, knows things in a fundamentally different way from human beings. given that aquinas relies heavily on boethius’ understanding of god’s eternity, we might borrow here a helpful passage from boethius’ consolation of philosophy: “since god abides for ever in an eternal present, his knowledge, also transcending all movement of time, dwells in the simplicity of its own changeless present, and, embracing the whole infinite sweep of the past and of the future, contemplates all that falls within its simple cognition as if it were now taking place. and therefore…thou wilt more rightly deem it not foreknowledge as of something future, but knowledge of a moment that never passes.”10 just as a man on a watchtower could be said to exist on a different spatial plane from the procession he observes, god exists on a “plane” (that is, eternity) which is separate from the procession of time. all events are present to god’s gaze, just as all the people walking below are visible to the man on the watchtower. this fact in no way eliminates the temporal aspect of things: events are truly past, present, or future in themselves and in their relationships to us, just as the people in a procession really are walking in a particular order. thus we could say that god knows all events, past, present, and future, not as past, present, or future, but rather by knowing their respective temporal aspects. it is simply the case that the transcendence of god’s “knowledge of vision” allows all events to be present to his sight at once, in a way that our knowledge does not. therefore, to repeat aquinas’ answer to the question at hand, insofar as future contingents are present to god, there is no necessity imposed by god’s certain knowledge: this is the solution to temporal fatalism. 9 st i 14.13 10 ancius boethius, the consolation of philosophy, book v, prose vi, as translated by harm goris in the theology of thomas aquinas. 60 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college iv. solution to causal determinism the argument in the previous section focused on showing that god does not impose necessity on future contingents by having prior knowledge of them. but even if god’s eternal “knowledge of vision” leaves room for contingency, the problem remains that his knowledge, considered as the cause of everything which exists, does still seem to impose necessity. thus we still encounter the problem goris calls “causal determinism.” for aquinas’ response to this problem, we can look to his discussion of free choice, as the relevant kind of contingency for this discussion (contingency in natural, as opposed to voluntary causes, has a more straightforward explanation having to do with impeding causes and the like).11 on free choice, however, aquinas writes: “free choice is a cause of its own movement in the sense that through free choice a man moves himself to act. however, freedom does not require that what is free should be the first cause of itself – just as, in order for something to be a cause of another, it is not required that it be the first cause of that thing. therefore, god is the first cause and moves both natural and voluntary causes. and just as, in the case of natural causes, he does not, by moving them, deprive their actions of being voluntary, but instead he brings this very thing about in them. for within each thing he operates in accord with what is proper to that thing.”12 like the solution to temporal fatalism, the appeal made here is once again to god’s transcendent nature, such that the mode of his causation far surpasses the mode of causation of the things he creates which act as secondary causes. god’s causal activity involves giving being of a particular nature to the things he creates, and it is precisely a thing’s nature which determines whether that thing’s causal acts are the result of necessity, or of its own free will. god does not merely cause an effect, but also shapes the way in which that effect acts as a secondary cause. in support of this argument, consider the doctrine of creation ex nihilo. goris summarizes aquinas’ relevant teaching on this point: “only god, who is subsistent being itself, causes being as such, and to him belongs exclusively that causal act that does not presuppose anything, namely, creation out of nothing. within the existent created order, creatures do have their proper causal role: they cause something to be this, or to be such.”13 god’s primary act of creation is the “complete emanation of the totality of an entity,” the effect of which is the existence of a thing where nothing was before. this is utterly unlike the effects of secondary causes, which can merely cause changes in existing things as proper to their own nature.14 in communicating esse to his creatures, god’s act of creation not only brings about a thing’s existence, but also 11 thomas aquinas, commentary on the metaphysics, trans. john p. rowan, joseph kenny, ed., vi 3.1210. 12 st i 83.1 ad 3 13 harm goris, “divine foreknowledge,” p. 114. 14 st i 45.1, 5 61issue iv f spring 2017 preserving human freedom its mode of existence – including its ability to act freely or necessarily as appropriate to its nature. on this system, the two kinds of causes, primary and secondary, do not exclude each other, but rather operate on different planes. we can truly say that god is the first cause of every effect, in that he gives being to every effect, but his transcendent act of causation allows him to give being to contingent effects as contingent in accordance with the free acts of their secondary causes; this is the solution to the problem of causal determinism. on a related note, it is worth pointing out that on aquinas’ view, god himself acts freely; aquinas maintains that “god acts, in the realm of created things, not by necessity of his nature, but by the free choice of his will.”15 although god’s free choice to create this particular world does not solve the problem of causal determinism arising from god’s causal activity in the world he created, it does address the related problem that would arise from god’s necessarily creating this particular world, or from his necessarily creating at all. aquinas’ conception of god avoids this particular criticism. v. objections to aquinas finally, in this section, i will deal with objections to and alternative explanations of aquinas’ solutions to temporal fatalism and causal determinism. i will focus on the sort of objections which arise from a lack of consideration given to the aspect of god that i have stressed the most: his complete transcendence. one such objection is voiced by william craig, who claims that, although god’s knowledge of vision does not impose logical necessity, his causal knowledge (or scientia approbationis) does impose causal necessity: “to say that [an event] is contingent means that it is not causally determined by its proximate causes in the temporal series. but this seems entirely irrelevant; for the event, whatever its relation to its proximate causes, is still causally determined to occur by the divine scientia approbationis. worse still, thomas seems to have forgotten that those secondary causes are themselves also similarly determined, so that even on this level contingency seems to be squeezed out.”16 this objection can be rather straightforwardly refuted in the framework established above. recall that aquinas thinks, in the case of secondary causes that are free beings, that god “does not, by moving them, deprive their actions of being voluntary, but instead he brings this very thing about in them.”17 now, whether craig should accept this claim from aquinas is of course a point that could be debated; it might be that craig finds it simply untenable that there is a first cause which is even able to give 15 thomas aquinas, summa contra gentiles, trans. james f. anderson, ii 23.1. 16 william lane craig, “aquinas on god’s knowledge of future contingents,” thomist: a speculative quarterly review 54, no. 1 (1990), p. 78. 17 st 83.1 ad 3 62 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college being to something as contingent upon a secondary cause’s free choice. either way, craig is certainly wrong to claim that aquinas has forgotten about the contingency or necessity of secondary causes. for the sake of discussion, if we grant aquinas’ conception of a transcendent god who creates ex nihilo, it seems that we do have good reason to believe that he is perfectly capable of giving being to causes precisely as necessary or free, voluntary or natural. thus we might claim that, at the very least, aquinas would think craig’s objection could be answered on the basis of the transcendent nature of divine causation. likewise, aquinas could respond in a similar way to the objection put forth by prior regarding the argument for god’s timeless act of knowledge. it seems to prior that in the statement “god knows p,” those wishing to support the timelessness of god must think of the verb “knows” as tenseless; this means that, strictly speaking, at any given time god knows nothing. but, prior claims, “it seems an extraordinary way of affirming god’s omniscience if a person, when asked what god knows now, must say “nothing,” and when asked what he knew yesterday, must again say “nothing,” and must yet again say “nothing,” asked what god will know tomorrow.”18 in response, we might say that prior has hit the nail on the head. aquinas’ solution is necessarily “extraordinary” – it seeks to describe the extraordinary nature of god. of course god doesn’t know anything now. now is an accident belonging to things in the created world, not to the creator. immutable, timeless knowledge belongs to god, who exists and knows in a way fundamentally different from ours. in a sense, prior gets it exactly right; he just doesn’t quite recognize the truth of his own argument in support of the transcendence of divine knowledge. finally, i would like to address two alternative solutions to this problem which are particularly interesting, namely the bañezian and molinist theories. these two rival camps emerged to debate the de auxiliis controversy at the end of the 16th century, with both sides operating under the assumption that aquinas had not fully explained his view, and thus working provide the necessary support for the true thomistic doctrine.19 on one side, bañez and the dominicans held that “god had predetermined the eternal decrees of his will to concur in an irresistibly efficacious way with the activities of creatures in time, even when they act freely.”20 that is, all it takes for a choice to be free is for god to determine it to be a free choice; it is perfectly acceptable to think of a free choice as being predetermined but not necessary. following this view, god foreknows future contingents precisely because he knows how he would predetermine any given situation.21 but to the molinist (or jesuit) camp this conception seems to be a denial of genuine human freedom. they insist on the doctrine of divine concurrence, whereby god acts with or through secondary 18 a. n. prior, “the formalities of omniscience,” in philosophy vol. 37 no. 140 (1962), p. 116. 19 harm goris, “divine foreknowledge,” p. 99. 20 ibid, p. 99 21 alfred freddoso, “introduction to the problem of free will and divine causality,” last edited 19 april 2013, p. 6. 63issue iv f spring 2017 preserving human freedom agents rather than on them, in order that he not predetermine free choice acts. then, in order to preserve god’s foreknowledge of future contingents, the molinists introduce a third kind of divine knowledge: middle knowledge. as knowledge of exactly which choice will be made in any given circumstance, whether or not that circumstance actually obtains, middle knowledge could be called “prevolitional;” god has this knowledge before he wills to actualize a particular reality. in this way, although god does not predetermine any free choice act, he considers his middle knowledge and factors that into his providential plan.22 there remains considerable debate over these two rival interpretations of the correct relationship between god’s knowledge, his causality, and the freedom of his creatures. without attempting to decide the question of which explanation is correct, here i will simply put forward two opposing arguments which appeal equally to the importance of god’s transcendence, as we have been discussing throughout the paper. on one side, alfred freddoso argues in support of bañez, claiming “i have little doubt that [aquinas] would side with the man whom i think of as his most illuminating commentator, viz., domingo bañez,”23 even if freddoso admits elsewhere that “[his] own sympathies lie with molina.”24 freddoso’s appeal, on behalf of bañez and aquinas, is to the transcendence of god’s causality: “god’s transcendence makes it perfectly appropriate to hold that his concurrence is not one of the circumstances of the free actions of creatures. as st. thomas makes clear, god stands wholly outside the order of created causes…thus god can causally predetermine that a good effect should be. so god’s transcendent causation means there is no worry that the predetermination of a free choice act somehow causes it not to be free.”25 on the other hand, goris uses god’s transcendent mode of being to argue against both the bañezian and molinist interpretations. goris is concerned primarily with their imposition of an order of priority onto god’s knowledge, whereby god’s simple knowledge is “logically prior” to god’s causal knowledge, which is again prior to god’s knowledge of vision. although their approaches are different, goris claims that both explanations are equally inappropriate, because they forget the fundamental teaching of divine simplicity, which precludes any real order in god himself. therefore, “it may be the case with human knowledge and human will that it is necessary that something is known if it is to be an object of the will, but this does not apply to divine knowledge and will…what lies, finally, at the root of both bañez’s and molina’s view is one and the same original sin. in both views creatures and creator are put ontologically on par.”26 thus it is clear that both freddoso and goris 22 ibid, p. 5. 23 ibid, p. 3. 24 alfred j. freddoso, introduction to on divine foreknowledge (part iv of the concordia), trans. alfred j. freddoso (ithaca: cornell university press, 1988), p. 41. 25 ibid, pp. 41-42. 26 harm goris, free creatures, pp. 80-82. 64 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college recognize the need to properly emphasize god’s transcendence, although it is not so obvious what conclusion ultimately follows. vi. conclusion with respect to the question of the relationship between divine knowledge, divine causation, and creaturely contingency, goris nicely sums up the heart of aquinas’ position: “god’s incomprehensible, eternal mode of being allows us to say that events which are future and contingent, and hence indeterminate in themselves and in relation to us, are present and determinate in relation to god. likewise, god’s incomprehensible act of giving being as such, including its modal qualifications, allows us to say that the creator sustains the causal action of creatures and gives being to their effects in accordance with the necessity or contingency of the secondary causes. “presence” and “causation” are said analogously of the eternal one and of the creator, and signify modes of presence and causation that elude our grasp.”27 there are two genuine problems arising from the combination of the principles above: the imposition of necessity by prior certain knowledge, and the imposition of necessity by a perfectly efficacious will acting as a cause. nevertheless, given divine simplicity, god’s “knowledge of vision” and his causal knowledge are part of one and the same eternal act. accordingly, we are not surprised to find that aquinas’ solution to both problems ultimately lies in the transcendence of god, reflected in his way of knowing and his way of causing that are of an entirely different kind from that of his creatures. god’s timeless act of knowing, as his certain knowledge of all events which are eternally present to his gaze, preserves the contingency in future events. similarly, god’s causal activity, rather than precluding contingency in his creation, actually enables contingency, as god alone gives being to contingent effects precisely as such. in conclusion, therefore, through his appeal to the transcendence of the nature of god, aquinas defends the compatibility of divine knowledge, divine causation, and creaturely contingency. f bibliography aquinas, thomas. “summa contra gentiles.” on the truth of the catholic faith, translated by james f. anderson, new york: hanover house, 1955. http:// dhspriory.org/thomas/english/contragentiles2.htm 27 harm goris, “divine foreknowledge,” p. 115. 65issue iv f spring 2017 preserving human freedom ——— “summa theologiae.” translated by alfred j. freddoso, university of notre dame. 2016 http://www3.nd.edu/~afreddos/summa-translation/toc.htm boethius, ancius. the consolation of philosophy. translated by harm goris. {see goris, harm. “divine foreknowledge, providence, predestination, and human freedom,” 2010.} craig, william lane. aquinas on god’s knowledge of future contingents. thomist: a speculative quarterly review 54.1 (1990): pp. 33-79. freddoso, alfred j. “on divine foreknowledge (part iv of the concordia)” translated by alfred j. freddoso. ithaca: cornell university press, 1988. ———“introduction to the problem of free will and divine causality.” last edited june 19, 2013. http://www3.nd.edu/~afreddos/papers/freedom%20and%20god.pdf. goris, harm. “divine foreknowledge, providence, predestination, and human freedom.” in the theology of thomas aquinas, edited by rik van nieuwenhove et al, pp. 99-122. notre dame: university of notre dame press, 2010. ——— free creatures of an eternal god. nijmegan: thomas instituut te utrecht, 1997. prior, a.n. “the formalities of omniscience.” philosophy 37.140 (1962): pp. 114-129. 79issue iv f spring 2017 δι αν οι α maurice merleau-ponty and alex garland: human consciousness in ex machina fisher pressman alex garland’s science-fiction film ex machina is the story of ava, an artificially intelligent robot, as she undergoes a turing test, an examination aimed at determining whether an artificially intelligent entity is conscious. garland forces the audience to ask what it means to be conscious, and whether a machine can have consciousness. maurice merleau-ponty stands as one of the most recognized existentialist philosophers of the twentieth century, who used phenomenological analysis to “demonstrate how the world is an experience which we live before it becomes an object which we know.”1 he emphasizes the uniqueness of the body, as “more than an instrument or a means; it is our expression in the world, the visible form of our intentions.”2 in this way, merleau-ponty’s philosophy provides a powerful tool for reading the film ex machina, particularly with respect to garland’s choice to use an incarnate robot, and the robot ava’s use of art as pre-linguistic expression. phenomenology and existentialism philosopher richard kearney suggests that “phenomenology and existentialism attempt to relocate the origins of meaning in our lived experience prior to the 1 richard kearney, modern movements in european philosophy (manchester, ny: manchester university press, 1995), p. 1. 2 maurice merleau-ponty, “prospectus” in robert solomon, existentialism (new york, ny: oxford university press, 2005), p. 275. 80 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college impersonal ‘objectivism’ on a narrow scientific attitude.”3 the renewed focus on lived experience, with an emphasis on being over objective truth, was a response to the increased focus on empirical and scientific methods being incorporated into philosophy and other disciplines in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.4 this shift towards positivism confined truth as one-dimensional, and, as a result, was met with a new approach towards understanding relation to the world5. phenomenology, according to robert solomon, “is the explicit conceptual manifestation of an existential attitude – a spirit of the ‘present age.’”6 he suggests that existentialism is an expression between harsh reason and the celebration of the individual. he concludes: “existentialism is this self-discovery. its presupposition is always the cartesian ‘i am’ (not ‘i think’).”7 it is not something to be defined, he argues, but an expression, a mood, a discovery of the self, with an essential understanding that personal, lived experience is our entry point into the absurdity of life, which begins with ‘i am.’8 merleau-ponty and existentialism maurice merleau-ponty is widely considered a leading figure in phenomenological philosophy. merleau-ponty writes in phenomenology of perception that phenomenology is “the study of essences […] such as the essence of perception or the essence of consciousness.”9 his project in this text is to examine what constitutes human experience and being in the world. he asserts that a study of human existence can be examined only through a study of phenomena as it relates to the essence of human facticity.10 for merleau-ponty, lived experience is necessary for being; the experience of being is not some abstraction of ‘i think,’ but ‘i am.’ he suggests that the world is a place in which we live and with which we communicate, but not something that any person can possess. the facticity of the world established the “weltlichkeit der welt [worldliness of the world],” which allows for the embodied experience of being.11 it is the facticity of living – of being in the world – that enables the “recognition that the body is not an object amongst objects, to be measured in purely scientific or geometric terms, but a mysterious and expressive mode of belonging to the world of our perceptions, gestures, sexuality and speech.”12 the necessary component for experiencing the world, for merleau-ponty, is the body, which allows for a means of 3 kearney, modern movements in european philosophy, p. 1. 4 ibid., p. 2. 5 ibid., p. 2. 6 robert solomon, existentialism (new york, ny: oxford university press, 2005), p. xi. 7 ibid., p. xii. 8 ibid., p. xx. 9 maurice merleau-ponty, phenomenology of perception (new york, ny: routledge, 2012), p. xxi. 10 ibid., p. xxi. 11 ibid., p. xxxi. 12 kearney, “maurice merleau-ponty” in modern movements of european philosophy, p. 73. 81issue iv f spring 2017 maurice merleau-ponty and alex garland opening the cogito to the world around it. this body is what senses, experiences, and lives, and from which our consciousness derives its relation to the world. merleauponty discusses the importance of the body for lived experience as our point of intentionality in the world in his work prospectus (a report to the collège de france). he writes:13 the perceiving mind is an incarnated mind. i have tried, first of all, to reestablish the roots of the mind in its body, and in its world, going against doctrines which treat perception as a simple result of the action of external things on our body as well as against those which insist on the autonomy of consciousness. these philosophies commonly forget – in favor of a pure exteriority or of a pure interiority – the intersection of the mind in corporeality, the ambiguous relation which we entertain with our body and, correlatively, with perceived things.14 human existence is not some abstraction, coming from the mind alone as other philosophers suggest, but is the lived, embodied experience and our relation to the world. solomon comments that “our bodies are not simply objects in the world (to which each of us has privileged but yet contingent access). the body is our being-inthe-world, the perspective from which we perceive, judge, value.”15 it is clear from this analysis that it is the body that gives us access to the world and provides us with a platform through which we can experience. kearney writes: “the ‘phenomenon’ of our embodied consciousness is precisely that ‘in-between’ realm – l’entredeux – which pre-exists the division into subject and object.”16 to be in the world is to have an experiencing body-subject, which is the platform for thought, for feeling, and for outward expression towards others. kearney concludes his analysis on the philosopher with a discussion of what being-in-the-world means for merleauponty: “we might sum up the adventures of merleau-ponty’s phenomenological dialectic in terms of this multiple, reversible equation: i think (consciousness) – i perceive (nature) – i express (language) – i create (art) – i relate with others (history) – i exist in the flesh of the world (being).”17 critique of language, the body, and the role of art a second major contribution of merleau-ponty is his critique of language, and his analysis of our signification in, and to, the world. kearney writes, “to perceive the world is already to make sense of it, to transform it into signs by expressing an intentional project of meaning. our carnal interrelationship with others is 13 ibid., p. 73. 14 merleau-ponty, “prospectus,” p. 274. 15 solomon, “maurice merleau-ponty” in existentialism, pp. 271-272. 16 kearney, “maurice merleau-ponty” in modern movements of european philosophy, p. 75. 17 ibid., p. 90. 82 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college therefore indicative of an intentional ‘signification.’”18 merleau-ponty argues that to make meaning of the world is to use language as a “sort of being,” as language’s “opaqueness, its obstinate reference to itself, and its turning and folding back on itself are precisely what make it a mental power; for it in turn becomes something like a universe, and it is capable of lodging things themselves in this universe.”19 in this way, it is language that gives rise to being through the interpretation of the body-subject. it is through the body-subject in the world that one can signify and interpret the signs from others.20 further, it is the use of language that creates the facticity of being necessary for human consciousness. as merleau-ponty notes in the above passage, through language one can situate oneself in the universe, and signal to others through linguistic mediation. an important aspect of language is the speech-act. speech enables one to connect with another individual, or as merleau-ponty writes, “to express is to become aware of another and himself.”21 he concludes, “speech … is that moment when the significative intention … proves itself capable … of shaping me and others.”22 speech plays a crucial role in shaping culture and relating to others, and allows for an interrelationship with people in the world.23 it is essential in establishing the human’s position in the universe, and it is what gives rise to the facticity of being. however, these signs are not limited to just language through speech. movement, too, is the expression of the thoughts of the body-subject. merleau-ponty writes: “language bears the meaning of thought as a footprint signifies the movement and effort of a body.”24 each individual has a unique style, conveyed through the movement, art, and speech of the body. he states that “style is the system of equivalencies that he makes for himself for the work which manifests the world he sees. it is the universal index of the ‘coherent deformation’ by which he concentrates the still scattered meaning of his perception and makes it exist expressly.”25 the pre-linguistic signifying to others is this individual style, which is achieved through external expression. merleau-ponty gives the reader an important example of the style of the body-subject in the world in his book signs. he writes: a woman passing is not first and foremost a corporeal contour for me, a colored mannequin, or a spectacle; she is ‘an individual, sentimental, sexual expression.’ she is a certain manner of being flesh which is given entirely in her walk or even in the simple shock of her heel on the ground – as the tension of the bow is present in each fiber of wood – a very noticeable 18 ibid., p. 79. 19 merleau-ponty, signs (northwestern university press, 1964), p. 43. 20 kearney, “maurice merleau-ponty” in modern movements of european philosophy, p. 79. 21 merleau-ponty, signs, p. 90. 22 ibid., p. 92 23 ibid., p. 92. 24 ibid., p. 44. 25 ibid., p. 55. 83issue iv f spring 2017 maurice merleau-ponty and alex garland variation of the norm of walking, looking, touching, and speaking that i possess in my self-awareness because i am incarnate.26 this passage clearly details what merleau-ponty means by style. the “woman passing” is not some robotic façade; rather, she is made a being-in-the-world by her style, her “walking, looking, touching, and speaking,” which constitute her unique set of expressions – set of gestures as pre-linguistic language – which give rise to her understood consciousness.27 finally, merleau-ponty highlights the use of art (whether painting or poetry) as a means of expression in the world: a mix of the style of movement, and a reflection of the pre-linguistic expression that body-subjects necessarily employ. as kearney notes: “merleau-ponty argues that artistic forms such as painting, music, and poetry provide a privileged access to the hidden workings of language. behind the transparency of secondary expression, art reveals the indirect voices of primary expression.”28 it is through art that the artist can interpret “the world out of everything he lived” by constituting “his corporeal or vital situation in language.”29 merleau-ponty suggests that art can reveal our experience in the world, and can, as kearney writes, open a “‘universal realm of primary expressions … a language common to all body subjects.”30 primary expression through pre-reflective art allows for translation across linguistic systems or cultural barriers, and allows for communication between people of varied backgrounds.31 phenomenology in ex machina the film ex machina directly addresses the question of human existence, and the phenomenology of maurice merleau-ponty offers an exceptional means of discussing the film and its presentation of artificial intelligence. the film is the story of caleb, a young programmer, who is selected to perform a turing test on the ai ava, created by nathan.32 the film is loosely structured around a series of seven interviews (or tests) performed by caleb over the course of a week, during which he tries to determine if ava is self-conscious. caleb becomes increasingly enamored by nathan’s creation, and ultimately helps ava to escape from the facility. director and writer alex garland uses the film as a medium to discuss what it means to be conscious; what it means for something to have sentience. he responds in an interview: 26 ibid., p. 54. 27 ibid., p. 54. 28 kearney, “maurice merleau-ponty” in modern movements of european philosophy, p. 80. 29 merleau-ponty, signs, p. 64. 30 kearney, “maurice merleau-ponty” in modern movements of european philosophy, p. 81. 31 ibid., p. 81. 32 a turing test is a test devised to determine if a computer has the ability to think. the test involves a human interacting with a computer, with the computer attempting to convince the human that it (the machine) is a human. a successful computer would be able to imitate a human so well as to convince the human examiner that it was sentient. if a computer can act and react like a human, then it should be considered able to think. in the context of ex machina, nathan admits that ava is clearly a machine, yet asks caleb to continue with a turing test to assess weather the machine (ava) can still pass, or be viewed as conscious, by a human. 84 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college if you talk about the problems of strong artificial intelligence and let’s say self-awareness – a self-aware machine – then you are immediately talking about human consciousness. that immediately brings you into the territory of how humans interact with each other, let alone how they interact with the machine. really just how sentience encounters and understands sentience. how does one consciousness know or feel sure what is happening inside another consciousness?33 it is clear that garland has an interest similar to merleau-ponty regarding what consciousness is and how we know if someone, let alone some machine, is sentient. two features of merleau-ponty’s phenomenology facilitate an interesting discussion of the problem of consciousness. garland uses the choice of a physically bodied subject for the robot, ava, and allows her to create drawn art as a means of presenting her existence in the world – both key concepts for merleau-ponty’s existentialism.34 the first approach that garland uses to discuss the consciousness of ava is through her representation as a carnal body, which moves, talks, and feels. the body is a central part of merleau-ponty’s understanding of consciousness because it is the mechanism through which one experiences the world. as noted above, consciousness is achieved only through “the intersection of the mind in corporeality, the ambiguous relation which we entertain with our body and, correlatively, with perceived things.”35 ava’s body has a special significance in the film because of the structure of the turing test used by nathan and caleb. garland intentionally creates ava with a machine-body that forces anyone interacting with her to know that she is a robot, yet still to believe that the robot is conscious. nathan, ava’s creator, says in scene 22 that “the real test is to show you she is a robot. then see if you still feel she has consciousness.”36 in an interview, garland comments on the decision to give ava a body, saying “the first time she appears, there’s no doubt about her machine status. large parts of her body are transparent and you can see through them.”37 he continues, “hopefully that starts to sort of introduce the more humanlike aspects of her in a sort of physical representation … a sense of life, but a sense of life which is other in some way.”38 it is essential that ava have a body because it is what gives her the sense of life, as well as a platform to interact with caleb and nathan; the body is also a prerequisite for consciousness according to merleau-ponty. later in the film, caleb asks why it is necessary that ava have a physical body.39 he asks nathan, “why did you give her sexuality? an ai doesn’t need a gender. she 33 o’hehir, andrew, “dark secrets of the sex robot: alex garland talks a.i., consciousness and why ‘the gender stuff’ of ex machina is only one part of the movie’s big idea” (salon magazine, 2015). 34 i will be using the pronouns she, her, and hers, herself when describing the robot ava. i will also use pronouns like it and its to describe the robot. the pronouns used mirror the gendered pronouns used in the film, as well as non-gendered pronouns used in the discussion of specific traits for a robot or non-living being. 35 merleau-ponty, “prospectus” in existentialism, p. 274. 36 garland, ex machina (2015), p. 26. 37 all things considered, “more fear of human intelligence than artificial intelligence in ex machina”. (2014) 38 ibid. [my italics] 39 garland, ex machina, scene 55. 85issue iv f spring 2017 maurice merleau-ponty and alex garland could have been a grey box.”40 nathan responds to caleb, “actually, i’m not sure that’s true. can you think of an example of consciousness, at any level, human or animal, that exists without a sexual dimension? what imperative does a grey box have to interact with another grey box? does consciousness exist without interaction?”41 the distinction is clearly made between ava – a robot with senses – and a grey box – the normal subject of a turing test. a physical body is necessary, as merleau-ponty suggests, to walk, look, touch, and speak.42 another important aspect here is the sexuality of the robot; it is important for garland to represent ava as “an individual, sentimental, sexual expression,” and not just as a box that interacts with speech alone.43 it is the mix of a “system of systems devoted to the inspection of the world and capable of leaping over distances, piercing the perceptual future, and outlining hollows and reliefs, distances and deviations” that gives life to ava, and which enables her to be a body-subject in the world.44 the importance of her physical body is most powerfully displayed in the final scenes of the film, when the newly escaped ava adopts a style by literally creating her final human body and, at the end of the film, when she moves through a crowd of people. these two scenes clearly show that human movement of gesture “embodied in the form of a ‘style’ which mediates between symbolizer and spectator.”45 the first of these instances takes place in the final ten minutes of the film, after ava has killed her creator, nathan. she walks into nathan’s room where other previous versions of ai robots are kept, and she begins to layer synthetic skin onto her robotic frame. it is also in this scene where she picks her final cut of hair (from a selection of wigs), and selects a dress to wear out in the world. the second notable instance is her entry into the world, as she leaves the house and enters the human world. in this scene, ava is mixed in a crowd of other people and, as someone moves past ava, she too disappears into the mass of other individuals. these two events can be read as the final attempts for garland to present ava as having created her own style, that “system of equivalencies that he makes for himself for the work which manifests the world he sees.”46 ava has made that her style, and her distinct expressions are her manifestation in the world. these final instances are, as kearney writes, both prime examples of the creation of meaning as “both within and without, both subjective and objective, spiritual and material; it reveals that being is not some mindless initself which threatens our free expression, but an intercorporeal life-world which gives us meanings and summons each body-subject to recreate these meanings for 40 ibid., p. 55. 41 ibid., pp. 55-56. 42 merleau-ponty, signs, p. 54. 43 ibid., p. 54. 44 ibid., p. 67. 45 richard kearney, “the dialectical imagination (merleau-ponty)” in poetics of imagining (new york, ny: fordham university press, 1998), p. 134. 46 merleau-ponty, signs, p. 55. 86 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college itself.”47 for the viewer, it appears that ava has become sentient during the film. through her carnal embodiment and sexual gesturing, ava has achieved the “walking, looking, touching, and speaking” which is present for incarnate self-awareness.48 further, she has become the body-subject, embodying the “perceptions, gestures, sexuality and speech” which exists for beings-in-the-world, and has created her own distinct manifestations in the world by the end of the film through speech, style, and dress.49 these preand post-linguistic signifyings through speech and motion are the necessary components of being for merleau-ponty, and it is clear that ava has achieved being through her speech and motion. the principles of phenomenology described by merleau-ponty offer an interesting and poignant analysis of ex machina through the prerequisite to be incarnate before conscious. the second important reference point between garland’s film and merleau-ponty’s phenomenology is the reliance on art as a means of communication, especially for ava. there are several importance scenes in which ava draws/creates art while she is confined in her quarters. the first example of her drawing takes place during the ‘session 2’ interview between caleb and ava.50 she says to him, “i brought you a drawing.”51 the notes in the script describe this first drawing presented to caleb as “totally abstract … a mesh of tiny black marks, that swirl around the page like iron filings in magnetic field patterns.”52 as their conversation continues, it is evident that ava is unsure what the drawing is, or why she made it, though she draws every day that she can. there are several other examples of ava’s art throughout the film. she presents to caleb a drawing of her room (or containment area), and then later in the film, ava draws a likeness of caleb, presumably to show her affection for him. she is also shown several times (over security cameras) during the film to be drawing while nobody is interacting with her. this recurring depiction of ava creating art is important because it relates to merleau-ponty’s notion of art as a means of pre-linguistic expression, and is used by garland to again highlight the sentience ava possesses. merleau-ponty suggests that accomplished artwork is that which has the ability to connect with the viewer in a meaningful way, and to invite the viewer into the world of the artist, leaving the previously “silent world of the painter” now “uttered and accessible.”53 ava’s drawings represent this type of art, which reaches out to caleb and allows him to access her consciousness through pre-linguistic expressions. the role of art in the film is important to give another means of humanizing the machine, to prove that while she does have the exterior of a robot, she also has thought, and the means of expressing this thought with gesture, ultimately giving rise to her being-in-the-world. 47 kearney, “maurice merleau-ponty” in modern movements of european philosophy, p. 89. 48 merleau-ponty, signs, p. 90. 49 kearney, “maurice merleau-ponty” in modern movements of european philosophy, p. 73. 50 garland, ex machina, scene 32. 51 ibid., p. 35. 52 ibid., p. 35. 53 merleau-ponty, signs p. 51. 87issue iv f spring 2017 maurice merleau-ponty and alex garland finally, another important scene focuses on art, but does not directly involve ava. the two men are in the midst of a conversation regarding ava’s supposed affections for caleb when nathan asks caleb about a painting in the room.54 nathan answers his own question to caleb: “jackson pollock. the drip painter. he let his mind go blank, and his hand go where it wanted. not deliberate, not random. someplace in between. they called it automatic art.”55 he continues, “the challenge is not to act automatically. it’s to find an action that is not automatic. from talking, to breathing, to painting.” this is remarkably similar to merleau-ponty’s discussion of the influential impressionist painter henri matisse, and is directly applicable to the discussion of human consciousness. he says of matisse’s painting style: a camera once recoded the work of matisse in slow motion… everything happened in the human world of perception and gesture; and the camera gives us a fascinating version of the events only by making us believe that the painter’s hand operated in the physical world where an infinity of options is possible. and yet, matisse’s hand did hesitate. consequently, there was a choice and the chosen line was chosen in such a way as to observe, scattered out over the painting, twenty conditions which were unformulated and even informulable for any one by matisse.56 the pollack painting in the film has the same meaning for garland as does the matisse painting for merleau-ponty. matisse “did hesitate,” before creating his masterful works of art, in order to create his works of art in a manner that only matisse was able to perfect.57 in an almost identical manner, nathan discusses the pollack painting, saying that it is “not deliberate, not random,” but someplace in between.58 the painting in the film stands as a representation for ava, the robot, and her feelings towards caleb as a being-in-the-world. she does not act precisely as some machine might, nor does she act with complete randomness; rather, ava, like matisse, acts with a calculated precision, sometimes hesitating, which gives rise to her consciousness and sexuality. her body, like matisse or pollack’s hands, is her “expression in the world, the visible form of [her] intentions.”59 merleau-ponty’s philosophy provides a powerful explanation for the role of art in ex machina, both through the robot’s creation of art and through discussions concerning art creation as a phenomenon of existence. conclusion merleau-ponty’s phenomenological analysis offers several powerful tools that the viewer can use to decipher and analyze alex garland’s film ex machina. these philosophical tools help the viewer to understand garland’s use of an embodied, 54 garland, ex machina, scene 50a. 55 ibid., p. 58. 56 merleau-ponty, signs, pp. 45-6. 57 ibid., p. 46. 58 garland, ex machina, p. 59. 59 merleau-ponty, “prospectus,” p. 275. 88 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college even sexual, robot who creates art in the context of human consciousness and being-in-the-world. and, on the flip side, garland unintentionally employs some of merleau-ponty’s most important philosophical contributions regarding both being and consciousness in his film to discuss whether artificial intelligence has reached sentience. his choices to create ava as carnal and his focus on art are both clearly intended to create an ai that the audience believes is sentient. it is fascinating that while merleau-ponty’s phenomenology explains ai through embodied experience, other notable philosophers have used his phenomenology to criticize the notion of non-human human consciousness. the writing of hubert dreyfus stands as perhaps the best example of this criticism. he comments: “heidegger, merleau-ponty, and michael polanyi have devoted a deal of thought to” the question regarding the “essential difference between meat machine and metal machine, between being embodied and controlling movable manipulators.”60 his conclusion, though, is the opposite of alex garland’s. dreyfus firmly believes that the concept of artificial intelligence “seems magical from the point of view of science”; he remarks, “there is no reason to suppose that a world organized in terms of the body should be accessed through any other means.” but perhaps that is the power of film, of the aesthetic art form garland uses. it seems that the failure of ai in the scientific fashion articulated by dreyfus is a failure merleau-ponty might not recognize, for both merleau-ponty and garland operate in the “domain of the phenomenal,” in questions of existence, and not in objective truth or positivist logic. merleau-ponty insists that we must go beyond science to question the world for ourselves through lived experience, and ex machina presents to the viewer a fascinating experience of consciousness, of the interconnectivity of individuals, and of the deceit of human will. f biblography all things considered. “more fear of human intelligence than artificial intelligence in ‘ex machina’.” national public radio [database online]. 2014. http://www.npr. org/2015/04/14/399613904/more-fear-of-human-intelligence-than-artificialintelligence-in-ex-machina. dreyfus, hubert l. “artificial intelligence.” the annals of the american academy of political and social science, vol. 412, 1974, pp. 21–33. ex machina. alex garland, universal pictures international, filmfour (firm), dna films, lions gate entertainment [firm], 2015. kearney, richard. the dialetical imagination (merleau-ponty). poetics of imagining: modern to post-modern. 2nd ed., new york: fordham university press. 1998 60 hubert dreyfus, artificial intelligence (sage publications, 1974), p. 31. 89issue iv f spring 2017 maurice merleau-ponty and alex garland ——— modern movements in european philosophy. manchester; new york: manchester university press. 1995 merleau-ponty, maurice. signs. translated by richard c. mccleary, eds. john wild, james m. edie, herbert spiegelberg, george a. schrader, william earle, maurice natanson, paul ricoeur and aron gurwitsch. united states of america: northwestern university press. 1964 ——— landes, donald a.,. phenomenology of perception. abingdon, oxon; new york: routledge. 2012 o’hehir, andrew. “dark secrets of the sex robot: alex garland talks a.i., consciousness and why “the gender stuff” of “ex machina” is only one part of the movie’s big idea.” salon magazine. 22 april 2015. solomon, robert c., existentialism. new york: oxford university press. 2005 dianoia ix adobe 4/21.indd 53issue ix ɢ spring 2022 the nature of human knowledge ˸˽ ˵́ ̃˽ ˵ the nature of human knowledge in light of empiricism after a critique of kantian epistemology burak arici it is generally thought that humans, by nature, have a tendency to question and know. we never feel satis!ed with the amount of knowledge we have, but rather, always seek more, wholeheartedly believing that knowledge is power. although we think that knowledge is exceptionally valuable, do we really examine the nature or real source of this power? discourse concerning the nature of knowledge has pervaded the history of philosophy. one of the conspicuous investigations of this inquiry is related to the origins of knowledge; how do we acquire, constitute, or reach knowledge? it can be said that there are two main epistemological approaches that try to give an answer to questions of how we really know: rationalism and empiricism. "e former, essentially, claims that knowledge derives from reason and that through the use of reason, we can directly comprehend certain truths such as logic, mathematics, ethics, and metaphysics. "e latter, in contrast, suggests that the source of knowledge is not reason, but sensory experience based on perceptual data. it is not di#cult to realize that these two opposite philosophical doctrines pave the way for divergent worldviews stemming from the radical di$erences in each method’s mechanism for the acquisition of knowledge. "ese approaches, on the grounds of their foundational attributes, are so in%uential that the divide between them persists in areas outside of their original philosophical domain. while a rationalist philosophy can attempt to explain logic, mathematics, or metaphysics through the existence of an ideal world 54 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college which is independent of the material world in which we live, an empiricist philosophy can try to do this by appealing only to sensory experience. however, how can we know which approach is true? do we have to choose one of them? §1 an overview of kantian epistemology immanuel kant attempts to solve the problems of knowledge through a synthesis of rationalism and empiricism. rationalism, which neglects the importance of sensory data acquired by perceptual observation, gives rise to groundless metaphysical conceptions, and that mere empiricism, which underestimates the capacity of reason, prevents us from learning any necessary truths about experience. put simply, he makes a distinction between that which we can know and that which we cannot know by positing two di$erent realms: the realm of phenomena to which we have access, and the realm of noumena (the world of things-in-themselves) to which we do not. along with that, he argues we can only have knowledge of what we can experience in the realm of phenomena. our mind processes information acquired from the external world by dint of sensory experience, and this gives it order to provide us the skill of comprehension. in parallel, he proposes some general categories by which human understanding operates and makes judgments like quantity, quality, relation, and modality. while kant repudiates the idea of obtaining knowledge from the noumenal world, “he [holds] that we can discover the essential categories that govern human understanding, which are the basis for any possible cognition of phenomena.”1 even though he agrees with empiricists that knowledge stems from experience, he champions the existence of a priori knowledge that can be reached without experience or sense data as opposed to a posteriori knowledge that requires experience to be known. concerning kant, h. j. paton elucidates that “we can have [a priori] knowledge by means of the categories, only if the categories are due to the nature of the mind and are imposed by the mind on the objects which it knows.”2 in other words, it is argued that the human mind has attributes that make a priori knowledge possible. in this vein kant makes another distinction in the categorization of knowledge to show how di$erent types of knowledge are revealed: the analytic-synthetic distinction. according to kant, propositions, similar to the di$erence between a priori and a posteriori, can be examined within the analytic-synthetic distinction on the linguisticjudgmental ground. while analytic propositions are true or not true only by virtue of meaning, synthetic propositions are true or not true in their meaning-relation to the world. for example, the statement that all bachelors are unmarried demonstrates an analytic proposition because we do not have to con!rm, by observing the world, that it is the case. instead, this is necessarily and universally true solely by virtue of the meaning of the concepts “bachelor” and “unmarried men.” 1 amie "omasson, “categories”, "e stanford encyclopedia of philosophy (summer 2019 edition), edward n. zalta (ed.), url = <https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2019/entries/categories/>. 2 h. j. paton, kant’s metaphysic of experience, (london: george allen and unwin, 1936), 258. 55issue ix ɢ spring 2022 the nature of human knowledge quite the contrary, the statement that some bachelors are bald is a synthetic proposition since in order to test the veracity of this claim, we need to make some observations in the world and see if this is the case. at this point, it becomes possible to address a conceptual scheme which consists of the concepts “a priori, a posteriori, analytic, and synthetic” by their combination in the expression of human knowledge. for kant, propositions like “all bachelors are unmarried men” and “all squares have four equal sides” represent analytic a priori judgments, because we can know whether or not they are true before experience, and it is analytic on the grounds that they are true in virtue of their meanings instead of their truth-relations to the world. analytic a posteriori, on the other hand, establishes an empty category. analyticity is that which implies necessity and universality, and posteriority is that which depends on observation and that has the capacity to create di$erent possibilities. "erefore, there is a contradiction between the two terms. synthetic a posteriority refers to observational judgments that can also include di$erent possibilities (e.g., the car is red, it is raining). hence, this category, as the exact opposite of analytic a priori, represents the cluster of observations that are not necessary and universal. lastly, synthetic a priority seems contradictory like analytic a posteriori, but in kant’s account of knowledge, it remains a signi!cant element. for him, mathematics and causality, for instance, show synthetic a priori knowledge. consider “7+5=12.” kant brie%y argues that we cannot regard this equation as analytic, since, as he writes in the prolegomena, “[t]he concept of twelve is in no way already thought because i merely think to myself this uni!cation of seven and !ve, and i may analyze my concept of such a possible sum for as long as may be, still i will not meet with twelve therein” [4:269]. "at is, we cannot think of this proposition in the same manner as, say, “all bachelors are unmarried,” because those simply do not have the same logical structure in that the concept of bachelor is equivalent to the concept of unmarried in terms of meaning, whereas the concept of twelve is not equivalent to the concept of the sum of seven and !ve. rather, we infer twelve from the sum of seven and !ve by our empirical intuitions. other than that, this mathematical proposition is a priori for the reason that it is also possible to know the proposition independently of experience. likewise, causality is synthetic a priori in that in order to comprehend this phenomenon, we need to !rst experience the cause and e$ect relation. besides, it is a priori for the same reason — it is possible to know the proposition independently of experience. inferring their truth and knowing these independently of experience may seem contradictory, but kant expounds this issue by asserting that the human mind operates through categories in relation to perceptual data within space and time and makes judgments. "ese judgments about mathematics and causality, like any other judgments, are subject to the mind’s processes. in other words, the grounds or foundations of synthetic a priori knowledge reside in the principles and regulatory structure of the mind. “[t]he concept of cause is not empirical but rather a pure category of the understanding, required to make 56 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college sense of the relation of events within experience.”3 we put the mind into action through sensory data in the investigation of the knowledge of reality and in this way, we reach the necessary and universal knowledge of the phenomenal world and laws of nature. as kant puts it in critique of pure reason: “even laws of nature, if they are considered as principles of the empirical use of the understanding, at the same time carry with them an expression of necessity, thus at least the presumption of determination by grounds that are a priori and valid prior to all experience.”4 after all, in kantian epistemology, the obvious synthesis of rationalism and empiricism becomes easier to discern by the clari!cation and combination of the concepts “a priori, a posteriori, analytic, and synthetic” and in this way, we can understand kant’s suggestion as to how to acquire knowledge and know reality. §2 does kantian epistemology really work? it is no question that the kantian conception of knowledge has attracted many philosophers. it has been thought that it provides a consistent and cogent solution to the shortcomings of rationalism and empiricism by allowing the existence of both “knowledge-before-experience” and “knowledge-after-experience” within a conceptualization of the analytic-synthetic dichotomy. kant’s conception of synthetic a priori knowledge, particularly, deserves attention at this point, because he makes an extraordinary move in opposition to the classical conception of knowledge at his time by introducing synthetic a priority. before kant, david hume, in an enquiry concerning human understanding, claimed that human knowledge consists of “relations of ideas” and “matters of fact.” to clarify, “recent empiricists have formulated hume’s challenge in the a priori–a posteriori, analytic–synthetic terminology. "eir position, the modernized version to the extent that it is directly inspired by hume’s doctrine, can be formulated in this way: all knowable propositions are either analytic a priori or synthetic a posteriori.”5 "at is, hume’s understanding of knowledge only consists of analytic a priori and synthetic a posteriori, and unlike kant, excludes synthetic a priori. "e reason that kant’s introduction of synthetic a priori knowledge is of great importance is better comprehended through the di$erence between the ways kant and hume understand laws of nature. in simple terms, according to kant, by means of observation (not being con!ned within meanings or in short, syntheticity), we can discover necessary 3 antony flew, a dictionary of philosophy, (london: macmillan, 1979), 102 4 immanuel kant, critique of pure reason (paul guyer, allen w. wood, trans.), (cambridge, united kingdom; new york, ny, usa: cambridge university press. 1999), [a159]. 5 georges dicker, hume's epistemology and metaphysics: an introduction, (london; new york: routledge. 1998), 41. 57issue ix ɢ spring 2022 the nature of human knowledge and universal phenomena of which we actually have knowledge before experience. yet, hume argues that it is impossible to reach necessary and universal knowledge of the world through experience, but rather, the only knowledge that we have through experience is synthetic a posteriori in that we observe the world (syntheticity) and reach probable knowledge that can be known after experience and that, in principle, has the chance to change in lieu of being necessary and universal knowledge. for instance, kant would consider gravity to be synthetic a priori because unlike analytic truths, the knowledge of this phenomenon can, !rstly, be learned through experience, and then, it can be discerned that gravitational attraction is necessary and universal on the grounds that “[gravity] cannot be viewed as simply an [empirical fact] about the true motions […] for without this property we are unable to de!ne the true motions in the !rst place”6 hume, quite to the contrary, would regard gravity as simply an empirical fact. in other words, the reason that objects fall down to the ground cannot be explained through the law of gravitation, but rather, this phenomenon is synthetic a posteriori, and there is no rationale to claim that objects will fall down every single time necessarily and universally. what makes us think that objects will fall, in fact, is not the law of gravitation, but our past experiences: we make generalizations as to how nature works by relying upon our past empirical data and apply them to the future events. however, kant, as a response to hume, holds that it is not the case that we cannot reach necessary and universal laws of nature, but instead, we can have this knowledge by the active role of human mind in the formation of knowledge: as kant, in the prolegomena, says, “"e understanding does not draw its (a priori) laws from nature, but prescribes them to it.”7 "at is, we have laws of nature in our minds before experience, but in order to know or make sense of them, we need to experience or see how they work in nature. "is reasoning, at !rst glance, may seem quite convincing today, as we have learned a lot through modern science about how human beings perceive and experience the world. we can consider this example: we see di$erent colors via certain cells in the eyes that enable us to perceive them. when some light waves re%ected from an object come to our eyes, we can see its color if this biological system works properly, and this shows, like gravity, a use of laws of nature and thus, indicates a priority, necessity, and universality in its epistemic possession. in kantian terms, it could be paraphrased in such a way that even if we did not see any object, we would still come to know, owing to the related cells in the eyes, that we have the concept of color in our minds, but so as to understand or make sense of this concept, we need to see an object: understanding, say, redness becomes possible only after seeing a red object. yet, the question is: how can we really know whether we have such a priori concepts, laws, categories, and so on in our minds without 6 michael friedman. “kant on space, the understanding, and the law of gravitation: ‘prolegomena’ §38.” "e monist 72, no. 2 (1989), 243. 7 immanuel kant, prolegomena to any future metaphysics that will be able to come forward as science: with selections from the critique of pure reason (gary hat!eld, trans.). (cambridge, uk; new york: cambridge university press, 2004), [4:320] 58 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college assuming their presence? if our genes or physiological systems are di$erent names for those, then this claim is absolutely true, but at this point, that which is implicated, in fact, is that we already have the knowledge of colors (or other a priori laws and principles), but we simply do not understand those before experience. a color-blind person cannot see some colors as a person who is not color-blind can see. does it mean that color-blind people have the de!ciency of some inherent concepts in their minds? "e kantian answer could be that they do not have such a de!ciency, but nevertheless, they cannot comprehend or make sense of colors as non-colorblind people can do due to the fact that they do not possess adequate and propitious biological equipment that enables them to catch the required sensory data. "e same question arises once again: what is the rationale behind assuming the pre-existence of such concepts? our biological instruments, surely, play a signi!cant role in what we understand and how we experience the world in accordance with our development and adaptation in the evolutionary history of humankind. in parallel, our genes can provide us the opportunity to know or experience certain kinds of things in the world as discussed in the example where we can see redness through particular cells, but does carrying certain genes mean that we have the knowledge of what these genes carry? what is knowledge, then? our congenital tendency or capacity to walk, for instance, does not express that we have a priori knowledge of walking even before starting to walk, but rather, it only shows that our biology enables us to act in such a way. "us, we can say that our genes or physiological systems are not concepts, categories, or knowledge, but our equipment to have knowledge, because knowing that we can walk or understanding redness is a conscious phenomenon of which we become aware through establishing beliefs about ourselves. or the world by means of observation. what kant means here is the existence of such a framework consisting of a priori concepts, categories, and so on from the abstract and rationalist standpoint, but the proposal of such a framework, in fact, implies a groundless metaphysical assertion, since how can we claim, for example, that a color-blind person has the concept of redness, or that a healthy person who has been unconscious since his or her birth and who has no experience about the world has such a structure in the mind? alternatively, claiming that making such abstractions and creating concepts or categories after experience is much more compatible with our knowledge about ourselves and the world, and seeing that becomes easier when we test the compatibility between so-called a priori knowledge and what we see when we look at the world. kant’s proposal of synthetic a priori, in this way, comes together with such criticisms in its reformulation of mathematical and scienti!c knowledge. although the idea of synthetic a priori seems di#cult to disprove, we can ultimately see that it fails. besides mathematics and laws of nature, kant holds that formal logic is also a priori, 59issue ix ɢ spring 2022 the nature of human knowledge that is, it has nothing to do with empirical data in its epistemic status and analysis.8 considering that logical rules, laws, or principles are totally abstract, and that they, in a way, manifest the structure of our minds, it, at !rst sight, seems again plausible to hold such a view that our knowledge or possess concepts, laws, principles, and so on that are a priori, necessary, and universal, then what we expect, when we look at the world, is that we never make a mistake in our conception of a priori, or that we never understand a priori things di$erently in relation to the physical world, since they are necessarily and universally true; and known or possessed before experience. however, as science and technology develop, nature continues to surprise us. a groundbreaking discovery has shown that our a priori and certain logical rules that we think of as necessary can tell us a di$erent story. it has been found, after the emergence of quantum logic, that one of the laws in formal logic, namely the distributive law, is not always true in quantum logic. “"e distributive law is sometimes false in quantum logic because of the superposition principle (and the projection postulate) in quantum mechanics.”9 "is situation has enormous implications as to the nature of human knowledge. while the aforementioned law works in the macro-cosmos in which we live, it does not on the quantum scale. "e reason can obviously be propounded through the explanation that the universe works di$erently on di$erent scales, but the actual question that we must ask in our inquiry is: why do we call such laws (and other forms of a priori knowledge) a priori, and along with that, necessary, and universal? "e example of the distributive law, clearly, indicates that this is not the case. for, if these are a priori elements in our minds with such and such qualities, then how can we be mistaken even once? "ere should be a di$erent explanation as to the nature or origin of logic and, in the broadest scope, of human knowledge, as we see the implausibility of the presence of a priori knowledge. all these points suggest that empiricism provides the only solution to the question of the origin of human knowledge. §3 the real leading roles in epistemology: syntheticity and a posteriority once we intend to eliminate the possibility of a priori knowledge, we are left with, as expected, only a posteriori knowledge. "us, it becomes natural to claim that knowledge, in fact, only stems from experience, and that it has nothing to do with any pre-given knowledge. yet, it is still too early to arrive at this conclusion based on what we have covered so far, since there are other aspects in the defense of knowledgebefore-experience that we should examine. notwithstanding the problematicality of a priori knowledge, some characteristics of human knowledge seem to show that there is a priority, but as we shall see, we can actually explain these through a posteriority. 8 immanuel kant, critique of pure reason, (b170). 9 gibbins, p. f. “why the distributive law is sometimes false.” (analysis 44, no. 2, 1984), 64. 60 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college in contemporary epistemology, one of the most controversial aspects is perhaps the presence of the analytic-synthetic dichotomy. "e consensus has been that the distinction between analytic and synthetic knowledge is as obvious and natural as that of a priori and a posteriori. "e latter distinction is totally understandable, because the origin of knowledge is either experience or mind, whereas in the former, learning becomes a matter of either observation or of appeal to language. "e problem concerning a priori appears within the context of its relation to analytic propositions: if there is no a priori, how can we then explain analytic truths? let’s again consider the statement “all bachelors are unmarried men.” "ough it seems to be a matter of language, do we actually know before experience that this is the case? do all these clear analytic descriptions or inferences not require the existence of a priority because of the fact that analyticity implies a priority or knowledge-before-experience? "e most well-known attack on the analytic-synthetic distinction, indubitably, comes from w.v.o. quine. he attempts to show the nullity of this dichotomy through indicating that analyticity is circular. "at is, to learn the veracity of synthetic statements, we make observations or look at facts without appealing to the statements themselves, but for analytic propositions, we show this through analyticity itself, even though we believe that those propositions are true solely in virtue of their meanings. along with quine’s conclusion, it can be ascertained that analyticity, in fact, is fundamentally grounded upon syntheticity, and in this way, we come to the conclusion that the only way to have knowledge is foundationally syntheticity. "is paves the way for a posteriori knowledge by revealing facts in the world by means of experience, that is, empiricism is the only successful philosophy compared to rationalism or kantian epistemology, which combines empiricism and rationalism. to comprehend how analyticity fails and is rooted in syntheticity, we should brie%y delineate quine’s argumentation. to begin his argument, he makes a distinction between analytic propositions with regards to their ways of justi!cation. he compartmentalizes analytic statements into two categories: the propositions that are logically true and the propositions that are true by synonymy. consider this sentence: “no unmarried man is married.” in this classical example, we can logically see the truth of this sentence without any consideration of the interpretations of “man” and “married” when "no", "un-" and "is" have their ordinary meaning.10 on the other hand, we need to dissect analytic statements from the perspective of synonymy when we encounter this sort of example: “no bachelor is married.” recalling that analytic propositions are true or not true only by virtue of meaning, the meanings of “bachelor” and “married” become important elements in this inquiry in a way that this sentence, by the synonymy between “bachelor” and “unmarried man,” can turn into “no unmarried 10 w. v. quine. “main trends in recent philosophy: two dogmas of empiricism.” ("e philosophical review 60, no. 1, 1951), 23. 61issue ix ɢ spring 2022 the nature of human knowledge man is married.” analyticity by synonymy is ultimately understood via analyticity by logic, but this transition, quine points out, is problematic in that it is circular, and this will later show us how possible it is to surmount the di#culty of understanding analyticity on the grounds of syntheticity without falling into circularity. a !rst strategy could be to use the de!nitions of “bachelor” and “unmarried man” in order to demonstrate how they are synonymous. surely, a dictionary can help us !nd out their de!nitions, but because a dictionary only provides a report of the de!nition of a word which is already known, this method does not represent the synonymy between them. if so, what is the way then to know that they are synonymous and hence, constitute an analytic statement that is true only in virtue of meaning without requiring any empirical data? at this point, quine tries to use interchangeability in their synonymy.11 according to this conception, if two terms are interchangeable in all contexts without any change in their truth-value, they are synonymous. for example, “‘bachelor’ has fewer than ten letters.” "is statement gives a quality of “bachelor,” but it also indicates that "bachelor" and "unmarried man" are not interchangeable in this sentence, since obviously, we cannot say “‘unmarried man’ has fewer than ten letters.” "erefore, we have no reason to justify the analytic sentence “a bachelor is an unmarried man” under these circumstances. however, when we attempt to appeal to interchangeability for synonymy, that which we are really concerned with is not the formal structure of the words, but rather, quine argues, cognitive synonymy, how we actually understand them. yet, at this point, another issue arises. "e problem is that we have to presuppose the knowledge of the meaning of analyticity to expound cognitive synonymy. to put it another way, it is simply asserted that we know the synonymy between “bachelor” and “unmarried man” by claiming that they are synonymous, or by referring again to their meanings: using analyticity. in contrast, quine states, “what we need is an account of cognitive synonymy not presupposing analyticity.”12 we can, hence, say that putting forward cognitive synonymy or proposing that we know the synonymy between the words simply in virtue of our cognitive ability to know their meanings without any further justi!cation is another way to use analyticity. as another attempt to resolve this problem, quine suggests the use of “necessarily” in order to circumvent this situation. he argues that if we use such an adverb, it becomes possible to avoid using meanings, and thus, analyticity. nonetheless, the same problem comes to the surface for the reason that the concept of necessity applies only to analytic propositions; justifying a sentence through including “necessarily” still presupposes analyticity. consider the statement “necessarily all and only bachelors are bachelors”. since we hold that “bachelor” and “unmarried man” are interchangeable, this proposition turns into “necessarily all and only bachelors 11 ibid, pg. 27. 12 ibid, pg. 28. 62 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college are unmarried men.” we try to explain this interchangeability through an appeal to necessity as an alternative to the use of meaning and avoid analyticity, but indeed, what is done here is to change the site of analyticity from the synonymy between the words “bachelor” and “unmarried man” to “necessarily.” analyticity, in this situation, is used by means of necessity, because “[t]o suppose that [necessity makes sense] is to suppose that we have already made satisfactory sense of 'analytic.'”13 "erefore, only the acceptance of analyticity can establish synonymy, and in fact, propositions like this, theoretically, show no di$erence from statements that are logically true in terms of their justi!cations. quine argues for the circularity of analyticity to explicate the impossibility of analyticity. we can conclude, therefore, that the fundamental logic behind analyticity is that analytic statements are true, because they are true. however, there is still a question: if there is no analyticity, how do we still know “all bachelors are unmarried men” or “all squares have four equal sides” before experience? perhaps, the real question should be: do we really know them before experience? "is question is di#cult to answer if they are a priori self-evident knowledge that require no further justi!cation to be held. in other words, what if they are self-evidently true in virtue of necessary and universal a priori knowledge as manifestations of our a priori logical reasoning that has nothing to do with our presuppositions or the way we use language? language is a way to express our thoughts or beliefs in accordance with some logical structures in our minds, and especially in analytic propositions, it is crucial that true statements are the ones that comply with our logic. "at is the reason that quine states that when we use analyticity, we indeed turn statements that are true by synonymy into statements that are logically true. "us, along with his argument that analyticity is circular, the major takeaway from his argument is that analyticity depends on the idea of a priori logic. "is allows us to claim that “all bachelors are unmarried men” is true because it is logically true and requires no further justi!cation. however, when it comes to the original way we know them, the dispute between rationalism and empiricism arises: is it something we know before experience, or are there really such a priori concepts or categories that shape our judgments, etc.? in this case, what is in question is the origin of logic since, as we have shown, analyticity is fundamentally grounded upon logic. yet, in our discussion of the distributive law, we saw that the idea of a priori logic could be wrong. so, does this totally eliminate the presence of a priori logic in the context of analyticity? after all, we can roughly express that the purest form of analyticity is “x is x” or “x=x” "erefore, the question turns into “how is ‘x is x’ or ‘x=x’ true?” and in fact, other than how synonymy occurs, this is the fundamental 13 ibid, pg. 29 63issue ix ɢ spring 2022 the nature of human knowledge goal of analyticity.. is “x is x” or “x=x” known before experience? "e answer is that it is indeed known after experience even though this appears counter-intuitive. in order to create a proper conception of x in our minds and argue that it is identical with itself or the same as something else, we need to experience x in relation to other things. similarly, to understand “a bachelor is a bachelor” or “an unmarried man is an unmarried man,” we !rst need to understand the meanings of bachelor and unmarried man. consider the !rst example. if this statement were an analytic proposition in a way that it is argued, then we would only comprehend this sentence by reading it. yet, what guarantees that the former bachelor and the latter bachelor are the same? "e former could mean an unmarried man, whereas the latter could mean a person who holds a !rst degree from a university. so as to establish the sense of analyticity in the form of “x is x,” we need to ensure that they have the same meaning, but we can only do that empirically. "us, we leave the realm of analyticity and enter syntheticity, and this brings about the emergence of a posteriori knowledge. "is situation may not happen for “an unmarried man is an unmarried man,” since the meaning of “unmarried man” is understood more precisely unlike “bachelor.” considering, however, that the meanings of words in a language depends on the context or language in which they are being used, this could apply to any word, and that shows the empirical aspect of language and the necessity to appeal to the external world to verify its true meaning. hence, it is not surprising to see that we can understand “all bachelors are bachelors” after experiencing and creating a suitable conceptualization of what is being experienced. we can claim, therefore, that analyticity lies on the ground of syntheticity, and that the knowledge acquired from so-called analytic statements like “all bachelors are unmarried men” or “x is x” is indeed synthetic a posteriori because we need to check the veracity of these statements, according to the way they are being used, through observation, and this syntheticity gives rise to a posteriori knowledge rather than necessary and universal a priori knowledge. "e same process occurs on the grounds of not only language, but also our conceptualizations in the sense of understanding the existence of ourselves and the world. for example, when we state, “all squares have four equal sides,” we describe an abstraction based on experience in the sense that after seeing squares with the same property —four equal sides—we conceptualize this shape and claim to know, in an analytic a priori manner, that “all squares have four equal sides.” "is demonstrates how we come to know the world through generalizations. as we have seen, empirical generalizations, according to hume, are synthetic a posteriori and cannot be considered to be necessary or universal. "erefore we cannot reach any certain knowledge of the world like laws of nature, and unlike his idea of “relations of ideas”, or in modern version analytic a priori it can be said that these sorts of propositions, laws of nature or logical principles, can be known in a synthetic a posteriori way by 64 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college rejecting analyticity and a priori through unfalsi!able scienti!c generalizations of our experience of reality. for instance, we have discussed the distributive law and suggested that since it does not work under the conditions of quantum mechanics, it cannot have a necessary and universal property, and hence, we cannot regard it as a priori. instead, as we do for every phenomenon, we can think of this law as synthetic a posteriori knowledge, but this does not mean that it cannot be generalized and count as certain or universal. before quantum logic emerged, this law had worked perfectly, and nobody questioned the truth of it. however, once quantum physics changed this, its truth, necessity, or universality started to be questioned. does this suggest that we should abandon this law while speaking of human knowledge? "e answer, of course, should be no. just because the law does not always work on the quantum scale does not mean that it is wrong in every situation. likewise, newton came up with several laws in order to describe how the universe works, but it was said that newtonian physics is wrong after einstein. yet, it is still used in science and technology. if it is wrong, why is it used? "e reason is obviously that it does work particularly in machine parts, %uids, planets, spacecrafts, and so on, but it does not within the context of einsteinian physics or quantum mechanics. furthermore, we still call newtonian laws laws. if these are wrong, how can they be called laws? to conceive what is really happening here, we should understand how laws, principles, axioms, logical rules, etc. come into existence on the grounds of unfalsi!able scienti!c generalizations. when we say, for example, that the sum of the interior angles of a triangle is 180 degrees, through the scienti!c method, it is ultimately concluded that this is true and represents a law, rule, or principle. a law then is something that is unfalsi!able. "is is indeed how we know facts about the world and our logic. similarly, logic is an extension of the external world in the sense that after making observations and generalizing facts, we conceptualize what we see in the world and state some certain rules or principles. however, as science and technology develop, we gain a broader understanding of how the universe works and start questioning what we think of as certain. we found out that the laws of newtonian physics or some logical laws like the distributive law do not work in all cases. yet, these still work well in the conditions that we most often encounter. after einstein and quantum physics, it was understood that newtonian physics is wrong, but it still describes the world that we experience by common-sense with high precision. "is shows that those are unfalsi!able in this world, because their veracities were tested in this world, and along with that, they have become laws in this world. yet, when we discover other areas of the universe, new laws, rules, or principles concerning the di$erent mechanisms of these areas emerge. 65issue ix ɢ spring 2022 the nature of human knowledge "us, we can eventually see that our whole knowledge of the world and logic can be expressed via syntheticity and a posteriority, since all these facts require experience to be known and lack necessity and universality in the broadest scope. "e distributive law, for example, can count as a law when it is observed only in the world where it is unfalsi!able, but in quantum mechanics, it cannot. it is synthetic, because we need to look at the world or the speci!c conditions where it is being used in order to see if it is true, and it is a posteriori, since we come to know it only after experience through unfalsi!able generalizations under certain conditions. "is endorses the idea that human knowledge stems only from our empirical observations, not from a priori phenomena. "is argument, therefore, strongly supports the repudiation of knowledge-before-experience, and thus rationalism. notwithstanding all those points, there are two aspects of the issue to be explained such as the knowledge of the things about which unfalsi!ability is not always used and as a more fundamental subject, the knowledge of the self. §4 the knowledge of the self and the external world when we see a chair, for instance, we think we know that there is a chair. we do not think there is a need to rely upon the cumulative knowledge of humanity to make sure that our knowledge about the presence of the chair is unfalsi!able. moreover, what guarantees that this holistic and shared knowledge of humanity is true? how can we be sure that what we are seeing is true? what if there is no chair, and we live in a delusion? surely, this can only bring us to cartesian skepticism. if only empiricism can explain the nature of human knowledge, and if the world where we live might be a delusion, then how can we really experience and know the world or trust empiricism at all? at this point, the only knowledge we can have, it could be argued, is our individual existence. we can only say, “i think, therefore, i am.” however, is this not known independently of experience? what we have seen so far champions the view that knowledge independent of experience is impossible, but can we argue that the knowledge of the self is the only a priori knowledge, and thus, empiricism ultimately fails? descartes makes a strong case when he argues, “i think, therefore, i am.” it is, most of the time, held that he proves his existence independently of the external world by doubting everything. at the most fundamental level, he, in fact, knows nothing, but his a priori existence. he knows it, because it is self-evident to him, and this situation requires no further justi!cation. "is is a crucial point in any inquiry of human knowledge, since after considering skeptical arguments (particularly, the agrippan problem) that cast a shadow over the possibility of human knowledge and argue that epistemic justi!cation is impossible, we can more easily establish the importance of having self-evident truths upon which the rest of human knowledge. "at is to say, we need self-evident knowledge, at least at the fundamental level, to speak of the 66 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college possession of knowledge. if so, what is this basic and self-evident knowledge, and is it a priori? at this point, seemingly, we agree with descartes with regards to the existence of self-evident knowledge, but when it comes to its origin or how it is found,there is an apparent di$erence. we will focus on the idea of the self-evident existence of the self which, in this argumentation, is independent of the external world, and this independence, indeed, is the element that causes a problem here. in order to conceive this issue, we should !rst comprehend how we come to know ourselves. "e process of knowing the self only occurs in relation to things that we perceive in the external world. in other words, this knowledge becomes a process of self-perception only after the perceiver perceives himself or herself, and becomes aware of his or her existence. however, once we try to isolate ourselves by focusing on our own distinct self as though it is totally independent of the external world in a way that descartes does, we !nd ourselves in a delusion in respect of the origin of the self by thinking that it can be known even in the absence of experience. descartes argues that we can know that we exist without experiencing anything, but the knowledge of the self only arises after experience, since self-realization occurs after understanding that we are the perceiver. even if we think that the only thing we know is our a priori existence, the properties or nature of this existence will be limited to what we have experienced so far. it can be proposed, therefore, that the knowledge of the self is not analytic or a priori, but rather, more precisely, synthetic a posteriori in that it requires experience every time by realizing the distinction between the perceiver and what is being perceived, and it cannot be known before experience. after all, although the knowledge of the self arises as a result of experience, we can still argue that it is self-evident, since regardless of its origin this knowledge ultimately appears to our consciousness in a way that it is known directly or self-evidently. when it comes to the knowledge of objects in the external world we can say that their existence is also self-evident because of the fact that, regarding our relationship with the external world in terms of the emergence of our self-awareness, it can be inferred that their existence is a main requisite to realize our own existence that emerges as a part of the physical reality, and thus, similar to how we self-evidently know the self, their existence appears to us as self-evident. moreover, this direct shift in our comprehension of existence allows us to look at reality in a much more comprehensive manner in the sense that we can no longer grasp reality from the internal perspective in which we can only know our own existence, but only from the external perspective in which we can look at ourselves as a part of the external world. however, we know that we are living beings that consist of physiological systems that could have malfunctions or that could cause illusions, etc. "at is to say, we could sometimes be wrong in our judgments, but under normal circumstances of our biology, when our body works without any problem, we will not be mistaken 67issue ix ɢ spring 2022 the nature of human knowledge very often. when one is drunk, one could argue that there are two chairs in the room actually when there is one, or there could be an illusion for a sober person, but if more people independent of each other test this claim several times, then it will eventually be con!rmed that there is one chair in the room. "is perfectly describes the scienti!c method with the notion of unfalsi!ability. "is is how certain facts, laws, or principles are established within the synthetic a posteriori framework. yet, as we have said, this is valid for the world we examine. when electrons and protons are considered, on this scale, there will be no chair, only particles. does it, however, mean that what we see, in fact, is a delusion? after considering that the existence of the chair in the room is self-evident to us, we can conclude that the world we experience is not a delusion, but it represents reality to which we have a direct access, and that at the same time, it is not the ultimate reality. we cannot know the ultimate reality due to the fact that our experience and knowledge are limited. "is situation does not necessarily mean that we are wrong as to our judgments of reality, but instead, as we develop new instruments that broaden our horizon by making more empirical data visible to us, expanding our knowledge about reality in various aspects becomes possible. 27issue x ◆ spring 2023 how can we reach the true definition of something δι ά νο ια how can we reach the true definition of something? essence, definition, and teleology in aristole's metaphysics minjun lee “!e ultimate value of life depends upon awareness and the power of contemplation rather than upon mere survival.” -aristotle introduction what is wisdom (sophia)? in metaphysics, aristotle says, “clearly, wisdom is knowledge of certain principles and causes (ἡ σοφία περί τινας ἀρχὰς καὶ αἰτίας ἐστὶν ἐπιστήμη, δῆλον)” (982a2). 1 for him, the task of metaphysics is investigating being qua being, the principles and causes of being.2 !e inquiry into being qua being signi"es the question of what a being is. what a being is and what a substance is are the same: “namely, what is being? is just the question, what is substance?” (1028b3).3 aristotle believes that a substance is equal to an essence: “the essence, the account of which is a de"nition, is said to be each thing’s substance” (1017b22). !e essence and the de"nition (horismos) are one in some sense: “the de"nition is the account of the essence” (1031a11). if the essence of a thing x is p, then the de"nition of x is the statement “x is p.” !us, reaching the true de"nition ! "is citation from metaphysics refers to the loeb translation. # metaphysics 1003a20-27 $ all citations here and throughout this paper refer to the reeve translation; see appended bibliography. 28 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college of something is identical to knowing what something is and can be an answer to the question of metaphysics. nevertheless, there is a puzzle with aristotle’s method of reaching the true de"nition of something in metaphysics. he approaches the de"nition of something by dividing genera and "nding di#erentiae. however, if we follow aristotle’s system to reach the de"nition of something, we face the moment when it is questionable whether the de"nition by means of genera and di#erentia is the true de"nition. for instance, aristotle gives a de"nition of a human: “a human is a featherless, twofooted animal.”4 since the de"nition of something is the account of its essence, if the account “a human is a featherless, two-footed animal” is the true de"nition of a human, the essence of a human is nothing but ‘featherless and two-footed.’ !is is because the essence means “what something is” (1030a3). does such a de"nition truly capture the essence of a human being what a human is? although a human is the only featherless and two-footed living creature, this does not seem to be the true de"nition of a human. we know that what a human is goes beyond this de"nition by virtue of being a human. living a human life is more valuable than just surviving as one of the animals. !erefore, this de"nition is the mere taxonomic de"nition. !is de"nition does not express a vivid human life. hence, we should know how to "nd the true de"nition of something in order for us not to remain as a merely featherless, two-footed animal. unfortunately, aristotle does not give us any suggestion of how we can overcome this issue. unless we know the solution to surmount this problem with aristotle’s method, we may not reach the true de"nition of something. if we cannot reach the true de"nition of something, then we cannot know its true essence. !is is a signi"cant problem for aristotle, who seeks knowledge of what it is in metaphysics. however, there is a way of reconciling the method of reaching a taxonomic de"nition and a true de"nition. !is is the aim of this paper. we will not dismiss aristotle’s method of dividing genera and "nding di#erentia. instead, we will interpret the true meaning of the ultimate di#erentia in this paper. !is interpretation of the meaning of the ultimate di#erentia will guide us towards the true de"nition of something. hence, the ultimate goal of this project is to "nd the true meaning of the ultimate di#erentia of something, supplement aristotle’s method of division, complete his un"nished project, and reach its true de"nition. overview in order to achieve this aim, we will proceed in three parts. in part 1, we will investigate what a de"nition is and how aristotle approaches the de"nition by means of genera and di#erentiae. using this method, aristotle de"nes a human as ‘a featherless, twofooted animal.’ however, it is questionable whether this is the true de"nition of a human due to two reasons. !erefore, we will articulate why this is not the true de"nition of a human and begin to look for a solution. in part 2, we will attempt % metaphysics 1037b34 29issue x ◆ spring 2023 how can we reach the true definition of something to rectify this issue by showing that the ultimate di#erentia (teleutaia! diaphora) of something, is, in fact, the same as the end (telos), which lies at the heart aristotle’s theory. in part 3, we will attempt to reach the true de"nition of something by reconciling aristotle’s method with its ultimate di#erentia (telos). part !: definition of genera and differentia what is a de"nition? !e de"nition of something is the account of its essence. aristotle says, “for the essence is just what something is (ὅπερ γάρ τί ἐστι τὸ τί ἦν εἶναι)” (1030a3). !us, if we ask the question “what is a human?” then the answer to this question would require the essence of a human. nevertheless, what does he mean by “what something is?” let us look at another explanation for the essence to have a better grasp of it. aristotle describes the essence as what it is said to be intrinsically: !e essence of each thing is what it is said to be intrinsically. for the being for you is not the being for musical. for you are not intrinsically musical. [your essence], therefore, is what you are [said to be] intrinsically. (1029b14-15) you can be musical. however, you do not need to be musical. you can still be you without being musical. being musical is not necessary for being you. !erefore, it is accidental. however, let us assume that there is some characteristic p essential to being x. since to be p is necessary for x, x cannot be x without it. hence, the essence of each thing is that which is necessary to being it. !us, it appears that the de"nition of a thing is the account of what is necessary to being it. !en, what is the account (logos)? !e greek word ‘λόγος (logos)’ means speech or thought. !us, the de"nition of something is the speech or thought of its essence. however, what we want to know is the essence of something (or what something is), since the main task of metaphysics is the investigation of what something is. in that case, why do we need speech? !e reason may be that the essence of a thing does not belong to us; it belongs to the thing itself. !us, if we want to relate to and understand a thing, we need some mediator between it and us. it is the speech (logos) that belongs to us and expresses our understanding of it.5 !us, the de"nition belongs to us since a de"nition is a kind of an account. we come to the essence by means of a logical procedure of our language. and since an account consists of a subject and a predicate that states an attribute of the subject, the de"nition also has a linguistic structure composed of a subject and a predicate. hence, since the de"nition of a $ in on the soul, aristotle explains in detail how we cognize and understand a sensible object logico-linguistically. when we perceive (aisthanesthai) a sensible object, imagination (phantasia) works. because of imagination, a mental image (phantasma), the sensible form of a sensible object, is presented to us (427b20). and then, our thinking capacity, the mind (nous), thinks this mental image. !inking (noe") is the process in which the mind in the active sense makes the mind in the passive sense actually identical with the objects of thought (430a14-17). when we think a thing, we make the notion of it. when we try to understand an object, we combine notions and make an account such as “s is p.” !erefore, our understanding of the world is intertwined with our account. !e account of something expresses our understanding of it. (!is footnote refers to the loeb translation.) 30 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college thing is the account of its essence, the de"nition is the linguistic expression of that which is necessary to its being. if the de"nition consists of a subject and a predicate, what kind of thing can be the subject of a de"nition? in other words, what can we de"ne? in metaphysics, aristotle deals only with substance (ousia) for the de"nition of something: “it is clear, therefore, that only of substance is there a de"nition” (1031a1). !erefore, only substance can be situated in the subject of the de"nition. what, then, is a substance?6 in his early book categories, aristotle divides a substance into two groups: particular objects and species.7 individual things (tode ti; a “this something”), such as an individual man, are substances. and species (a human) and the genera of these species (an animal) are also substances. !is shows us that aristotle thinks that both a particular substance (say, socrates) and a species (say, a human) or the genus of a species (say, an animal) can be a substance in a broad sense. nevertheless, aristotle thinks that not all substances are proper candidates for the subject of their de"nitions. of substances, we can only de"ne a species. !e de"nition is the account of the essence. only things that are species of a genus have an essence: “hence the essence will belong to things that are species of a genus and to nothing else” (1030a11-12). !erefore, only the species of a genus have their de"nitions.8 how, then, does aristotle express the essence of something in the predicate of its de"nition? !e subject of the de"nition of something is a species, so the predicate of its de"nition must be its genus and its di#erentiae. !is is made clear by the fact that he says a species is a genus plus di#erentiae: “the species are composed of the genus and the di#erentiae” (1057b7). undoubtedly, he expresses the account of its essence with its genus and its di#erentia: % what is a substance? !is is an extremely complicated question to answer since his explanations of a primary substance and a secondary substance in categories and metaphysics are di#erent. first, concerning a primary substance, in categories, aristotle explains that primary substances are particular objects (tode ti; a this something). in contrast, aristotle says that the what-it-is (to ti esti) is primary in book z1 of metaphysics (1027a14). why are they di#erent? !e simplest hypothesis i can make is that, in categories, he thinks that tode ti is primary, but in metaphysics, he divides tode ti into matter (hyl#) and form (eidos). by dividing tode ti into matter (hyl#) and form (eidos), he thinks the what-it-is (to ti esti) is primary. second, pertaining to a secondary substance, in categories, aristotle says that a species or the genera of a species are secondary. but in metaphysics, species are regarded as form (eidos). however, he thinks that form is primary in metaphysics. !ere would be more complexities related to what a substance is. nevertheless, this is not our main project in this paper. what we want to know here is what can have a de"nition. !erefore, with the question of what a substance is, we will merely think that a substance is that which exists (being) such as 1) movable and perishable things in the sub-lunar level (animals or cups), 2) movable and eternal things (planets), and 3) something immovable and eternal (the prime mover). (1069a29-33, metaphysics) & categories 2a13-18. ' why does aristotle think that there is no de"nition of a particular and perceptible substance? !ere are two reasons. first, an account does not admit the generation or destruction of something. (1039b23-30, metaphysics) perceptible and particular substances have matter. substances having matter can come to be and pass away. however, an account only outlines whether something is or is not. !erefore, there is no de"nition of perceptible and particular substances. for instance, socrates is a particular perceptible substance because socrates has his body, which is matter. !erefore, socrates is coming to be and passing away. we cannot de"ne socrates qua socrates. although we can de"ne socrates qua man, this is not a particular de"nition but his species de"nition. second, a subject itself should not be present in the predicate of its de"nition. (1029b18-20, metaphysics) !e predicate of a de"nition should explain its subject without using the subject in the predicate. for example, we should not say that the de"nition of a cup is “a cup is a cup that is . . .” however, if we attempt to de"ne a particular object, we will violate this rule. for instance, let us try to reach the de"nition of this cup. its de"nition would be something like “this cup is a cup which is here.” !is disobeys the rule that a subject itself should not be present in the predicate of its de"nition. in addition, aristotle also excludes the possibility of the de"nition of the genus of a species since the genus of a species does not have the essence. nonetheless, we can see that we de"ne an animal as a perceptual living thing, for instance. it seems that, for aristotle, we can give a de"nition of genus, but when we do this, we do not truly work on the question of what it is. 31issue x ◆ spring 2023 how can we reach the true definition of something we should "rst investigate de"nitions that are by division. for there is nothing else in the de"nition except the genus that is mentioned "rst and the di#erentiae; the other genera are in fact the "rst one along with the di#erentiae combined with it. (1037b28-30) by dividing genera, aristotle "nds the de"nition of something. first, he discovers the genus of something and then "nds the di#erentiae combined with the genus. for instance, aristotle o#ers “a human is a featherless, two-footed animal” as a de"nition.9 in this de"nition, a species (a human) is the subject, and the genus (animal) and the di#erentiae ‘two-footed’ and ‘featherless’ are predicated of it. nonetheless, before we try to follow how aristotle reaches this de"nition, we should understand what a genus and a di#erentia are. !e genus of something is the common thing of what are distinct in species: what is distinct in species is distinct from something, in something, and this latter thing must belong to both—for example, if an animal is distinct in species [from another], then, both are animals. hence [two] things that are distinct in species must be in the same genus. for this is the sort of thing i call a genus, that by reference to which both things are said to be one and the same, and which is not coincidentally di#erentiated, whether as matter or otherwise. (1057b34-1058a1) if we interpret the "rst sentence as “what is distinct in species (a) is distinct from something (b), in something (c),” we know that a and b are distinct in species, but both a and b belong to c. !en, c is the genus of a and b. for example, a human (a) and a horse (b) are distinct in species. however, the common thing they share is their genus (c). both a human and a horse belong to the genus of animals (c). !erefore, animal (c) is the genus of a human (a) and a horse (b). in addition, a di#erentia is what makes the di#erence between a and b: !is di#erentia, therefore, will be a contrariety (as is also clear from induction). for all things are divided by opposites, and it has been shown that contraries are in the same genus. for contrariety was seen to be complete di#erence, and all di#erence in species is di#erence from something, in something, so that this latter thing is the same for both and is their genus . . . hence the di#erentia is a contrariety. (1058a8-16) if we consider the di#erentia ‘two-footed,’ then between a human and a horse, a human is two-footed, but a horse is not. !erefore, this di#erentia makes a distinction between them within the genus “animal.” ( metaphysics 1037b12 32 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college so far, we have investigated what a de"nition is and what we can de"ne in metaphysics. !e de"nition of something is the account of its essence. !e subject of a de"nition is a species, and the predicate expresses its essence. aristotle thinks that he can logico-linguistically express the essence of a species with its genus and its di#erentia and reach its de"nition. he does this by the method of division and classi"cation.10 he proceeds from genus to species by dividing genera and "nding di#erentiae. accordingly, let us attempt to "nd the de"nition of a human using his method in order to understand the problem with his method. !e initial task is to "nd its genus. of things that exist in the universe, some are natural, and others are arti"cial. a human certainly belongs to the natural things category. aristotle says that natural things are simple bodies, such as earth, "re, water, and air, and living bodies, such as plants and animals.11 among natural things, a human is an animal. !erefore, a human is placed under the genus of animals. since the genus of animals is the proximate genus of a human, we know the genus of a human. however, under the genus of animals, there are innumerable species (say, a horse, a bird, a dog, a whale, etc.). !us, to proceed from genus to species, we should "nd the di#erentiae of a human. among animals, some are ‘footed,’ and others are not. a human belongs to footed animals. of footed animals, some are ‘two-footed,’ and others are not (say, ‘four-footed’). a human has two feet. !erefore, a human is a two-footed animal. nonetheless, there is still an abundance of two-footed animals: all types of birds, as well as humans, qualify as two-footed animals. we require more di#erentiae. how about ‘feathered? !e contrariety of ‘feathered’ is ‘featherless.’ a human does not have feathers. !erefore, a human is a featherless, two-footed animal. is there another featherless, two-footed animal? if so, we should "nd another di#erentia. however, a human is the only featherless, two-footed animal. hence, this is the de"nition of a human by means of genera. !e diagram below shows the journey of this division. 10 1037b29 11 physics 192b9-10 33issue x ◆ spring 2023 how can we reach the true definition of something we have followed the way in which aristotle expresses the essence of a species by "nding the most speci"c genus and di#erentiae. as a result, we have reached the de"nition of a human: a human is a featherless, two-footed animal. !is de"nition sounds plausible. no one would deny it. !e di#erentiae ‘featherless’12 and ‘two-footed’ are unquestionably essential characteristics of a human. a human is intrinsically ‘two-footed’ and ‘featherless.’ a human is the only animal having the di#erentiae ‘featherless’ and ‘two-footed’ together. !erefore, this de"nition is exclusive to a human being.13 however, is this de"nition satisfactory? !e de"nition of something is the account of its essence. does this de"nition capture the essence of a human quite well? we can be satis"ed with this de"nition if we regard ourselves nothing but featherless, two-footed animals! however, we are not satis"ed with the de"nition “a human is a featherless, two-footed animal” for two reasons. first, the combination of the di#erentiae ‘featherless’ and ‘two-footed’ are not what makes us humans in a positive sense even though these di#erentiae may set us apart from all other animals. in other words, these qualities express not what we ourselves are intrinsically but what other animals are not. aristotle says that the essence (to ti #n einai; ‘the-what-it-was-to-be’) is the cause: “it is evident, accordingly, that we are inquiring into the cause. !is is the essence, logico-linguistically (φανερὸν τοίνυν ὅτι ζητεῖ τὸ αἴτιον (τοῦτο δ᾿ ἐστὶ τὸ τί ἦν εἶναι, ὡς εἰπεῖν λογικῶς))” (1041a27). what is the cause of a thing x? !is question is the same question as “what causes x to be x?” !e answer is the essence of x. since the essence of x belongs to x, x is x. if the account “a human is a featherless, two-footed animal” is the true de"nition of a human, then the essence of a human is the combination of the di#erentiae ‘featherless’ and ‘two-footed.’ it means that because of these di#erentiae ‘featherless’ and ‘two-footed,’ we are humans. is it because “featherlessness” and “two-footedness” belong to me that i am a human being? de"nitely not; we know that what a human is goes beyond this de"nition. what is it to be a human? to live a human life is not just to exist as a creature which has no feathers and has two legs. although the di#erentiae ‘featherless’ and ‘two-footed’ seem to be essential components for a human because a human can move owing to two feet, these two essential qualities do not seem to make a human a human. how can we capture what it is to be a human in the de"nition of a human that aristotle suggests? without capturing the essence of something, it is hard to say that we know what it is. knowing what it is means that we know its essence and have reached its true de"nition. !erefore, if the di#erentiae of something do not capture its essence, it is unlikely that we know what it is and have reached its true de"nition. 12 it is strange to say that ‘featherless’ is essential for a human being. how can we talk about some non-existent qualities? we should say what a human has instead of saying what a human does not have. we will look into this problem in a few paragraphs. 13 in fact, there are some other ‘two-footed, featherless animals,’ such as kangaroos and tyrannosaurus rex, although i assume that aristotle is not aware of them in his life, unfortunately. 34 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college !e second reason why the de"nition reached by genus and di#erentiae is insu)cient is that the essence of something cannot be changeable, but the combination of essential di#erentiae seems subject to change. !ere are still copious di#erentiae that are essential characteristics of a human. a human is a ‘vertebrate.’ a human is ‘warmblooded.’ a human is ‘two-handed.’ if we begin the task of de"ning a human with another di#erentia, we will reach another de"nition of a human being. for instance, let us try to "nd the de"nition of a human with the di#erentia ‘vertebrate.’ we know the genus of a human is an animal. we can divide animals into ‘vertebrates’ and ‘invertebrates.’ a human is a ‘vertebrate.’ !ere are innumerable vertebrate animals. we can break them down into ‘warm-blooded’ and ‘cold-blooded.’ since a human is ‘warm-blooded,’ the tentative de"nition of a human is a warm-blooded, vertebrate animal. however, we know that there are a lot of warm-blooded, vertebrate animals. from this, we can add the previous example—‘featherless’ and ‘two-footed’—to the de"nition we have reached in this paragraph. !en, at the end of this process, the de"nition of a human is a featherless, two-footed, warm-blooded, vertebrate animal. !is shows that we will sometimes de"ne a human as a featherless, two-footed animal, and at other times we will de"ne a human as a featherless, two-footed, warmblooded, vertebrate animal. hence, the de"nition of something changes whenever we "nd another di#erentia. indeed, aristotle himself is aware of the problem with his dichotomous method in his book parts of animals: now if man was nothing more than a cleft-footed animal, this single di#erentia would duly represent his essence. but seeing that this is not the case, more di#erentiae than this one will necessarily be required to de"ne him; and these cannot come under one division; for each single branch of a dichotomy ends in a single di#erentia, and cannot possibly include several di#erentiae belonging to one and the same animal. it is impossible then to reach any of the ultimate animal forms by dichotomous division. (644a713, parts of animals) !e di#erentiae can be changed because one and the same genus can be dichotomously divided in many di#erent ways. he thinks that there is no single de"nition of an animal species. how can the essence of something change depending on the method of di#erentiation? how can sometimes ‘featherless and two-footed’ make a human be a human and other times ‘featherless, two-footed, warm-blooded, vertebrate’ make a human be a human? if the essence is unchangeable, the essential di#erentia should also be unchangeable. however, the combination of essential di#erentiae seems to be changeable insofar as we can swap out one di#erentia for another. why does this problem occur? we do not have a way to guide us among these decisions. we do not have a basis from which to decide because they both capture essential qualities. !erefore, even if we follow 35issue x ◆ spring 2023 how can we reach the true definition of something the methodical dichotomous division of the genus, we might run into problems. for example, consider that we want to de"ne a cup. !e genus of a cup is ‘vessel.’ however, both a house and a cup can be considered to be vessels. now, we need a di#erentia to distinguish them. a house is ‘doored.’ in contrast, a cup is ‘doorless.’ according to aristotle’s method, we "nd ourselves in a position of saying that a cup is a doorless vessel. we know that a door never has anything to do with a cup. similarly, though it is supposedly a “featherless, two-footed animal,” a feather does not have anything to do with a human at all. why do we consider some feature that does not apply to us as essential? how can something that we do not have make us what we are? by following the method of di#erentiation, we "nd ourselves including in the de"nition essential qualities that are lacking in the species and that have no relevance to a human and a cup. hence, even in the most careful application of aristotle’s method, we still reach a de"nition that includes arbitrarily chosen di#erentiae. so far, we have seen the reasons why the account “a human is a featherless, twofooted animal” is not the true de"nition of a human. !e combination of the essential di#erentiae of x might not make x be x. it is true that the combination of the essential di#erentiae of x may tell us that x is di#erent from any others due to the combination of the essential di#erentiae of x. however, it does not mean that these qualities signify what x itself is intrinsically. it only tells us what others are not. in addition, the arbitrariness of this method makes it vulnerable for us to reach the true de"nition. unless we know the essence of something, it is unlikely that we reach the true de"nition of something. we might have to be satis"ed with a mere taxonomic de"nition: “what de"nitions are like” (1038a35) while we pretend to think we know the essence of something. !erefore, in part 2, we will "nd a solution to overcome this problem. part ": the ultimate differentia #teleutaia diaphora$ is the end #telos$ in part 1, we attempted to understand what a de"nition is, what we can de"ne, and how aristotle reaches the de"nition of something by the method of division. however, this method is not enough to capture the essence of something. to overcome this problem and reach the true de"nition of something, we need to consider the ultimate di#erentia (teleutaia diaphora). as aristotle presents it, the ultimate di#erentia is the one that cannot be further divided. for instance, when we de"ne a human as a featherless, two-footed animal, we divide animals with the "rst di#erentia ‘twofooted’ and the second one ‘featherless.’ !en, we reach a point in the procedure at which it becomes impossible. nevertheless, it seems to me that the more signi"cant feature of the ultimate di#erentia is its aptitude for capturing the essence of a thing. 36 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college !erefore, the goal of part 2 is to investigate how to arrive at an ultimate di#erentia that is not arbitrary but that reliably captures the essence of the thing. if we know the ultimate di#erentia of something, we will reach its satisfactory de"nition. aristotle thinks this is the correct procedure to follow: “!us it is evident that the de"nition is the account composed of the di#erentiae, or, if it is in accord with the correct procedure, the ultimate one” (1038a28-30). without knowing the ultimate di#erentia of something, we might get lost in the labyrinth of the di#erentiae and not be able to "nd its true de"nition. aristotle suggests that the ultimate di#erentia will be the form and the substance: “if, then, we take a di#erentia of a di#erentia, one di#erentia—the ultimate one (teleutaia diaphora)—will be the form (eidos) and the substance (ousia)” (1038a2425). !is is the only clue we can use in order for us to reach the true de"nition of something. hence, the aim of part 2 is to understand that the ultimate di#erentia of something is its end (telos) by utilizing this hint. because aristotle says that the ultimate di#erentia is the form and the substance, the exploration of the form (eidos) and substance (ousia) is our primary task.14 !en, what are the form and the substance?15 aristotle thinks that form and the substance are the same: “and by form i mean the essence of each thing and the primary substance” (1032b1). and we have seen that the primary substance is the what-it-is.16 !e essence of each thing is what it is. !erefore, the form is the same as the substance. in addition, he says that the form and the substance are the activity: “so it is evident that the substance and the form are activity (ὥστε φανερὸν ὅτι ἡ οὐσία καὶ τὸ εἶδος ἐνέργειά ἐστιν)” (1050b1). !erefore, since the ultimate di#erentia is the same as the form and the substance, and the form and the substance are the same as the activity, the ultimate di#erentia will express the activity of the thing de"ned. !en, what is the activity (energeia) of something? aristotle says, “the activity is the end (τέλος δ᾿ ἡ ἐνέργεια)” (1050a9). and the end is the characteristic activity of a thing. it is that activity for-the-sake-of-which something is, without which it would not be what it is. !en what is the end (telos), or that for-the-sake-ofwhich? 14 indeed, this direction is reasonable. !e de"nition is the account of the essence. in fact, aristotle says that the essence belongs to the form and the activation: “since the essence belongs to the form and the activation (τὸ γὰρ τί ἦν εἶναι τῷ εἴδει καὶ τῇ ἐνεργείᾳ ὑπάρχει)» (1043b1). !us, if we know the form and the activation of something, we immediately come to know its essence. since the ultimate di#erentia of something is its form and its substance, and since our project aims to know what the ultimate di#erentia of something is, this is the correct path toward its true de"nition to investigate the form, the activation, and the substance. 15 we do not undertake a deep investigation of the meanings of the form (eidos) and the substance (ousia). remember that part 2 of this paper aims to understand that the ultimate di#erentia (teleutaia diaphora) and the end (telos) are the same. !e deep exploration of these terms will distract the big picture. 16 1028a14. 37issue x ◆ spring 2023 how can we reach the true definition of something !e end, and this is the for-the-sake-of-which—for example, of taking walks health is the end. for why does [he] take walks? “in order that he may be healthy,” we say. and in speaking that way we think we have presented the cause. also, anything, then, that comes to be as an intermediate means to the end, when something else has started the movement: for example, in the case of health, making thin, purging, drugs, or instruments, since all these are for the sake of the end, although they di#er from each other in that some are instruments and others works. (1013a33-1013b3) !e end of something or some action is that for-the-sake-of-which. why does he take a walk? or what is the function of him taking a walk? !e end of taking a walk is health. why does he make himself thin? or what is the purpose of making himself thin? to be healthy. why does he take drugs? to be healthy. all the instruments and actions here have an end, which is health. !is is because when we ask a question about instruments or works with the interrogative ‘why,’ one type of answers uses “for.”17 why do you eat? for health. why do you work? for making money or for serving the society. hence, since the ultimate di#erentia is the activity, and since the activity and the end are the same, the ultimate di#erentia is the end. for instance, let us consider a cup. !e end of a cup is to contain liquid. !en, the ultimate di#erentia of a cup is ‘containing liquid’ and ‘containing non-liquid (say, solids).’ we know that a cup is for containing liquid. !erefore, the ultimate di#erentia of a cup is its end. so far, we have demonstrated that the ultimate di#erentia (teleutaia diaphora) of something expresses its end (telos). in order to grasp the entire demonstration in the simplest way, let us look at its summary in a euclidean way: “!e ultimate di#erentia (teleutaia diaphora) is the form (eidos) and the substance (ousia)” (1038a25). “!e substance and the form are activity (energeia)” (1050b1). “!e activity (energeia) is the end (telos)” (1050a9). !e ultimate di#erentia (teleutaia diaphora) is the end (telos). !is shows us that aristotle’s terms ‘the ultimate di#erentia (teleutaia diaphora)’, ‘the form (eidos)’, ‘the substance (ousia)’, ‘the activity (energeia)’, ‘the end (telos)’ are the same. !erefore, the ultimate di#erentia of something is the same as its end. at the end of part 1 of this paper, we have seen the necessity of overcoming the problem with aristotle’s method. hence, we have looked for the possibility to surmount this issue in part 2. finding a solution begins with the fact that the ultimate di#erentia of something is the same as its form and its substance (or essence).18 we 17 physics 198a15-2 18 it is safe to say that the essence and the substance are the same in that both signify “what something is.” 38 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college have "gured out that the ultimate di#erentia of something is eventually the same as its end (telos). indeed, aristotle claims that the essence of something and its end are the same: “what a thing is and its purpose are the same (τὸ μὲν γὰρ τί ἐστι καὶ τὸ οὗ ἕνεκα ἕν ἐστι; the literal translation is “the essence and for-the-sake-of-which are the same”)” (198a25, physics). now, the procedure by genus and di#erentia that leads to the de"nition “a human is a featherless, two-footed animal” is like the process that we would use. however, this is not the complete version of this process. indeed, aristotle seems to acknowledge that this is not the perfect procedure for the true de"nition of something at the end of z 12: “where de"nitions by division are concerned, then, let this much su)ce as a "rst statement as to what they are like” (1038a35). here, aristotle seems to be suggesting that though this de"nition serves as an example as to how one might proceed by division, he is not necessarily asserting the given de"nition to be complete. nevertheless, we will not dismiss this procedure entirely. instead, since we now know that the ultimate di#erentia of something is its end, we will rely on a method like genus and di#erentiae, but we will involve a teleological ultimate di#erentia.19 !erefore, let us continue on to see whether we can fully capture the essence by "nding the ultimate di#erentia: that is, telos. part %: the definition of means of genera and the end #telos$ in part 1, we "gured out the reason why we cannot reach the true de"nition of something. !e cause of the problem is that we bifurcate the genera and species without knowing the ultimate di#erentia of something. !erefore, in part 2, we have made an e#ort to know what the ultimate di#erentia of something is. !e answer is that the ultimate di#erentia of something is its end. !erefore, "nding out the ultimate di#erentia involves not just "nding a feature that obeys contraries, but "nding a purposive division under the genus. now, we should assess whether we can reach the true de"nition of something when we know its end. !is is the aim of part 3. let us imagine an example. your friend asks, “what is the purpose of a house?” we may say that the purpose of a house is to shelter property and bodies. !is is the activity of a house: !at is why of [1] those who give de"nitions, . . . [2] !ose, on the other hand, who propose that it is a receptacle to shelter property and bodies, or something else of that sort, are speaking of the activation (energeia). . . for 19 see page 18 or 1038a28-30. 39issue x ◆ spring 2023 how can we reach the true definition of something it seems that [2] the account that it is given in terms of the di#erentiae is of the form (eidos) and the activation (energeia). (1043a13-19) !e activity of a house is the same as its purpose. since we know the purpose of a house, we know what a house is, and we can reach its true de"nition: “a house is a receptacle (or vessel) to shelter property and bodies.” !erefore, if we know a thing’s end, we can reach its true de"nition. however, as stated above, this does not reject aristotle’s method of division and classi"cation. !e only di#erence is that we do not divide the genus with arbitrary bifurcations. we add the ultimate teleological di#erentia to his method. for example, let us de"ne a doctor with aristotle’s method and the ultimate di#erentia. !e end of a doctor is to cure patients. with the method of genus and di#erentia, the genus of a doctor is a profession. !e ultimate di#erentia of a doctor is to cure or not to cure since this is the end of a doctor. !erefore, the true de"nition of a doctor is that a doctor is a professional who cures patients. likewise, let us de"ne a cup. !e genus of a cup is a vessel. !is is because there are many types of vessels, so that vessel is not a species but the genus of a cup. since we know the genus of a cup, if we know its ultimate di#erentia, we can reach its true de"nition. !e ultimate di#erentia (the end) of a cup is to contain liquid. !us, its true de"nition is a vessel that contains liquid. so far, all the examples we have examined are artefacts. since we create them with our craft, we certainly know the end of them. we are the e)cient cause of arti"cial things. we are builders who build a house or a cup. if we do not know the purpose of a house or a cup, it is impossible to make them. hence, we can reach the true de"nition of arti"cial things since we know their purposes. nevertheless, let us "nally attempt to reach the de"nition of a human. if we know the end of a human, then we can reach its true de"nition. what is the end of a human? let us attempt to "nd it in a two-fold manner if we can. on the one hand, aristotle suggests that knowledge is our end: “all humans by nature desire to know” (980a21). !is is possible because a human has reason (logos). !is is the most fundamental di#erence between humans and other living creatures: “man alone among the animals has speech (λόγον δὲ μόνον ἄνθρωπος ἔχει τῶν ζῴων)” (1253a10, politics). a human can think (noe"), understand (phrone"), and judge (krin"). !anks to this faculty, we naturally pursue knowledge. what do we want to know? we experience the world and understand it. however, a human’s desire to know does not merely signify knowledge of phenomena–that is, knowledge that “the ball i grab falls down to the ground when i unfold my hand” or “the sky is blue.” we want to know “why?” what causes these things? what is the cause of phenomena? !e primary starting-points and causes are what we want to know. !is is wisdom, as stated above. hence, all human beings think–no#sis–to know. !is is our activity (energeia). !is is our goal (telos). !erefore, a human being is for thinking. on the other hand, in nicomachean ethics, aristotle suggests that happiness is the "nal end of a human: “so happiness appears to be something complete and selfsu)cient, it being an end of our actions” (1097b20). in book 1 of nicomachean ethics, aristotle thinks that happiness is an activity of soul in accord with virtue: 40 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college …if this is so, then the human good becomes an activity of soul in accord with virtue, and if there are several virtues, then in accord with the best and most complete one (εἰ δὴ οὕτως, ἀνθρώπου δὲ τίθεμεν ἔργον ζωήν τινα, ταύτην δὲ ψυχῆς ἐνέργειαν καὶ πράξεις μετὰ λόγου, σπουδαίου δ᾿ ἀνδρὸς εὖ ταῦτα καὶ καλῶς, ἕκαστον δ᾿εὖ κατὰ τὴν οἰκείαν ἀρετὴν ἀποτελεῖται). (1098a16-18, nicomachean ethics) happiness is an activity of soul in accord with virtue. to achieve happiness, we utilize our logos (praxeis meta logou). by using our logos, the end of human beings is happiness. !is shows us that the end (telos) of a human and the activity (energeia) work together. it seems that our happiness does not have to do with the divine being. however, aristotle thinks that this happiness ultimately occurs with the divine being: if happiness is an activity in accord with virtue, it is reasonable that it would accord with the most excellent virtue, and this would be the virtue belonging to what is best. so whether this is the intellect or something else that seems naturally to rule, to command, and to possess intelligence concerning what is noble and divine, whether it itself is in fact divine or the most divine of the things in us—the activity of this, in accord with the virtue proper to it, would be complete happiness. and that this activity is contemplative has been said. (1177a13-18, nicomachean ethics) our happiness ultimately belongs to the divine being. !is is complete happiness. !is is contemplation. we think and contemplate. !is is our activity (energeia). we want happiness. !is is our goal (telos). !is happiness is contemplation. !erefore, a human being is for contemplating. both thinking and contemplating–our activity (energeia)–are possible because of our logos. both thought and contemplation–(telos)–occur with the divine being.20 since the genus of a human is animal, if we accept aristotelian teleological view, we can accurately de"ne a human as a thinking—or rational— animal.21 aristotle at various times refers to human as a rational animal, at other times as a featherless two-footed animal. we have seen two distinct de"nitions of a human that appear throughout aristotle’s corpus. !ey are not just two interchangeable de"nitions with equal utility. one is taxonomic, an example of what de"nition is 20 metaphysics 1026a15-18, 1026a28-31 21 one might point out that if we de"ne a human as a political animal, it is also arbitrary. sometimes, we de"ne a human as a political animal. at other times, we de"ne a human as a rational animal. it is a reasonable argument. however, it seems that for aristotle, political activity is subordinate to rational activity. a human being takes pleasure in society and lives an ethical life because of reason. !en, one might ask again how a political life and a contemplative life can be described under the realm of the de"nition of a human: “a human is a rational animal.” a politician is a practitioner who pursues practical wisdom. a philosopher, by contrast, pursues speculative wisdom. insofar as both a politician and a philosopher seek wisdom with reason, both of them are rational. 41issue x ◆ spring 2023 how can we reach the true definition of something like. !e other one represents the achievement that can be made when we know the true end of a thing—that is, true de"nition. now it gives us a model to follow in other cases and an appreciation for the di)culty of reaching de"nition in cases where the telos is hidden from us. conclusion for aristotle, the question “what is being?” is signi"cant. !is question is the same as the question “what is a substance?” !is question leads us to what the essence is. since the de"nition and the essence are one in some sense, if we know the essence of something, we can reach its de"nition. however, without knowing the ultimate di#erentia of something, it is unlikely for us to reach its true de"nition. for artifacts, we have access to the true purpose of anything that we make as humans. in addition, we are for thinking.22 so, we can reach the true de"nitions of artifacts and ourselves. however, for natural things other than humans, it is unclear whether we can know their purposes or not. we do not know whether our interpretation of phenomena is the same as the true end of a thing. while we experience the world, we observe the phenomena of things. we see an acorn growing up and becoming an oak tree. we think the "nal cause of an acorn is to become an oak tree. even if aristotle says that our perception of proper objects is always true,23 does aristotle think that we can know the ends of all the natural things? for instance, what is the unique end of the mature oak tree? it is di)cult to answer. all things are ordered and related to each other, contributing to the good of the world. !ey contribute to the order, the beauty, and the good of the world in their own ways. 24 !erefore, unless we know the order of the world, it is unlikely that we know the true end of things. hence, for natural things, taxonomic de"nitions might have to be enough. if we know their true ends, we will be happy. however, we may or may not know their purposes. so, we may know only what the de"nition is like. a horse, for instance, is approximately a four-legged hoofed animal, but this de"nition misses its essence. however, this does not mean that aristotle’s investigation of being and pursuit of wisdom in metaphysics has failed. !e mere taxonomic de"nition can be useful for scientists as aristotle was a scientist who tried to understand the physical world scienti"cally. furthermore, if the goal of humans is thinking and contemplating using our logos, then his task cannot be considered a failure. !inking and knowing are not the same. we are not sure whether we can know, but we can continue to seek wisdom about, for each thing that exists, the end. 22 !ere is a possibility that aristotle might think that not every human being is for thinking. for example, while natural slaves are humans, are they indeed for thinking? in addition, poets compose not by using reason but by inspiration. !is problem led us to the question of whether we can even de"ne a human. however, this is a wholly di#erent matter. although signi"cant, we will follow aristotle’s account of the goal of a human in metaphysics and ethics in this essay. 23 de anima 427b13 24 metaphysics 1075a15-25 42 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college references aristotle, metaphysics. loeb classic library edition. trans. hugh tredennick. cambridge, massachusetts: harvard university press, 1933. aristotle, metaphysics. trans. c.d.c. reeve. hackett publishing company, inc, 2016. aristotle, on the soul. loeb classic library edition. trans. w.s. hett. harvard university press, 1936. aristotle, categories. trans. j. l. ackrill. oxford: clarendon press, 1963. aristotle, parts of animals. trans. william ogle. new york: garland publishing, 1987 aristotle, physics. trans. robin water"eld. new york: oxford university press, 1996. aristotle, politics. trans. carnes lord. !e university of chicago press, 2013. aristotle, nicomachean ethics. trans. robert c. bartlett and susan d. collins. chicago and london: !e university of chicago press, 2011. 90 δι αν οι α jimi hendrix: creolization and the re-imagined black authentic robert engelman while jimi hendrix understood himself as a person of both native american and african-american heritage, he was well aware of his being perceived as a black person and a black artist, both in england and in the united states. this tension seems to have been formative in his understanding of race, his relationship to blackness, and, consequently, the formation of his own identity. in accordance with his refusal to treat race as consisting of fixed singularities with respective essences, hendrix, i argue, styled himself not as a crossover artist, but rather as a hybrid, creolized artist.1 towards this end, i analyze two opposed models of cultural and ethnic “relation”2 proposed by édouard glissant, the baroque and the métissage, and argue that hendrix thought and acted in a manner closer to the latter.3 then, i will analyze hendrix’s relationship with race (blackness in particular), which shifted dramatically towards the end of his life, and i will explore how this relationship should be evaluated. finally, i will examine his song, “voodoo child (slight return),” as a demonstration of his reflexive stylization as a creolized musician.4 1 that is to say, hendrix did not style himself to be a successful black artist in a white musical scene, but rather to be an artist who rejects such a divide altogether. 2 relation, to clarify, is glissant’s term for the interaction and change that occurs in cultural contact. 3 édouard glissant, the poetics of relation, trans. betsy wing (ann arbor: university of michigan press, 1997). pp. 26-27. 4 the terms ‘creole’ and ‘creolized’ appear throughout the paper and should be understood as analogous to ‘hybrid’ and ‘hybridized,’ where two or more ethnicities or cultures come into contact and yield something distinctive, rather than as a reference to creole culture specifically. 91issue iv f spring 2017 jimi hendrix the baroque and the métissage glissant introduces the baroque as an ideological model that regards ethnicity and culture as existing in a network of coming together and scattering, which entails that cultural contact can be untangled and that the respective cultures can thus be ‘restored’ to whatever state they were in prior to the contact. beneath this treatment is an assumption that cultures have essences that can remain pure or become tainted and diluted through cultural contact, and that because cultural contact compromises a culture’s essence, “no culture [is] rightfully impeded in the baroque; none [rightfully] imposes its tradition, even if there are some that export their generalizing products everywhere.”5 glissant claims that this ideology is a “derangement,” or a violent delusion, though a key confounding issue with eradicating such a derangement is that it has become concealed through its naturalization.6 thus, the baroque should be regarded as both a conceptually and ethically problematic ideological framework. conceptually, the baroque presumes cultural stability and continuity through an essence, which disregards the vast histories of cultural exchange and contact that have formed what we recognize as definite and unique cultures. moreover, this essentialist claim of fixedness depends on regarding culture ontologically, as some metaphysical entity that individuals participate in—perhaps in a platonic fashion wherein the ‘form’ of the culture never changes, but its instantiations may become ‘corrupted’— or as something natural within individuals that becomes corrupted through ‘mixing.’ the metaphysical, platonist model is ahistorical and lacks the explanatory power for the ways in which culture operates at both individual and group levels, while the natural model does not account for cultural learning and serves as a slippery slope towards racial tropes that justify oppression and violence. whichever model we may find more appropriately describes the presuppositions of the baroque (which, if we follow glissant, appears to be the second), it is clear that a model of cultural and ethnic relation, centered on essentializing and abstracting cultural identities from the lives of people who frequently exist at cultural crossroads, leads to either “intolerant exclusions” or “the manifest and integrating violence of contaminations,” both of which involve the relegation of individuals, groups, and cultures.7 this is to say that the baroque is not merely an abstracted, ideological model of ethnic and cultural interaction, but an ideology of said interaction that interpellates subjects into living in a manner that is consistent with much of the ideology’s principles and presuppositions. as a concept, interpellation refers to the phenomenon that, in receiving labels and legitimating them through response, we find ourselves implicated in, and governed by, the ideological frameworks that accompany these labels; to use a quotidian example, if a restaurant employee is treated by a patron as a waitress, and responds in a manner that demonstrates such a treatment to be appropriate (such 5 ibid., p. 92. 6 ibid., p. 91. 7 ibid. 92 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college as asking what the patron would like to drink), the employee is interpellated into a framework that governs how she ought to behave and how she will be treated by both the patron and those around her—namely, in accordance with her identification as a waitress. if we follow fanon, who discusses interpellation with particular attention towards blackness (which is, of course, pertinent towards the analysis of hendrix), we see that being designated as black is especially troubling insofar as it “connotes… a certain manner of not-being, [and] of being defective,” rather than being a proper subject who simply happens to be black.8 thus, through interpellation, the baroque enters into daily life by subjugating the labeled through the labeler, such that the black subject in particular becomes sub-subject in the interaction. because the baroque has exercised, and continues to exercise, much oppression in a manner through which its very ‘being an ideology’ or framework gets hidden, we should understand how crucial glissant’s project is in exposing the baroque as ideology, while offering a new ideology—more firmly grounded in historical realities—that combats the ethical and theoretical pitfalls of the baroque. glissant offers the métissage as a more truthful and more ethical ideology of cultural and ethnic interaction. rather than treating cultures as essential singularities, entailing that cultural contact is either inconsequential or ‘tainting’ to all cultures involved, the métissage treats cultures as fluid and worldly phenomena. accordingly, glissant regards the structure of relation as a “turbulent confluence” that is “neither fusion nor confusion… neither the uniform blend—a ravenous integration—nor muddled nothingness.”9 that is, cultures are fluid and worldly phenomena, which continually interact with one another in a number of ways, including, but not limited to, the exchange of goods and encounters between people. the hybridization that results from these forms of relation is not indiscriminate muddiness—as the baroque may characterize it—but is actually the formative process by which distinctive cultures come to be. by placing hybridity, diversification, and fluidity at the center of this process, the métissage inverts the baroque idea that cultural interaction taints and homogenizes cultures. rather than treating cultural contact as a phenomenon by which distinctive cultures become uniform, the métissage treats hybridization or creolization as a generative process by which cultures develop and emerge; this process of relation “senses, assumes, opens, gathers, scatters, continues, and transforms the thought of these elements, these forms, and this motion.”10 what is important to note in glissant’s view is that he humanizes relation between cultures by placing these imaginative and creative processes as central to it. thus, if we follow glissant, it is the case that, as cultures collide and take from one another, they become more complex and diversified, prompting and resulting from imaginative development. the ethical dimension of the métissage is, of course, made possible by its consistency with history and with living culture, but for our purposes, it is crucial to note how 8 pierre macherey, “figures of interpellation in althusser and fanon,” radical philosophy, 173.9 (2012): p. 16. 9 glissant, the poetics of relation, p. 94. 10 ibid., pp. 94-95. 93issue iv f spring 2017 jimi hendrix it challenges the tenability and the ethics of using the notion of authenticity qua legitimacy, which signifies something’s really having a particular identity, to describe cultures and individuals.11 by revising the understanding of cultures and individuals, the métissage model makes this sort of authenticity a given for all cultures and individuals, rendering it as a superfluous notion in this universe of discourse. as glissant describes this revision: the aesthetics of the chaos-monde… embraces all the elements and forms of expression of this totality within us; it is totality’s act and its fluidity, totality’s reflection and agent in motion… destructure these facts, declare them void, replace them, reinvent their music: totality’s imagination is inexhaustible and always, in every form, wholly legitimate—that is, free of all legitimacy.12 at least two points emerge from this passage. first, by treating the totality of a person’s identity as creative and imaginative in-itself, glissant’s model makes wholly compatible—if not necessarily entangled—imaginative stylization and authenticity, in both senses of the latter term. thus, for glissant, to be authentic does not entail that one need search for some deep-rooted essence that has become obscured or limit oneself to a supposedly fixed ‘essence,’ but instead allows for the freedom to explore and imagine what she could be. the imaginative totality of the self, for glissant, is constantly developing, and this development is always legitimate or ‘real’; this is to say that the legitimate components of one’s identity are not limited to one’s inherited identity, but include our decisions to involve ourselves in projects or to take on roles. to use a simple example, one is not born a doctor, but if one decides to become a doctor and goes through the process, then she becomes a legitimate doctor, as well as a legitimate member of whatever ethnicity and culture that she is born into. second, because glissant understands the individual as a creative agent and cultures as creolized and interacting, he readily accepts that there are innumerable permutations and idiosyncrasies of cultural possibilities. these manifold developing forms are inadequately, and all-too-often oppressively, generalized into categories that serve as the standards for authenticity in the baroque ideology. such categories cannot, however, be realistic guides for applying authenticity, as they deny the hybridity and imagination of cultures and agents while mischaracterizing the cultures they purport to encapsulate. that is, if we maintain authenticity as signifying legitimacy or ‘realness,’ then the notion becomes superfluous, and perhaps senseless, for judging cultures and cultural agents, because both are essentially condemned to this form of authenticity. if, however, authenticity signifies a way of relating to oneself and the 11 i acknowledge that content of the term ‘authenticity qua legitimacy’ is often expressed simply with the term, ‘authenticity’; however, the distinction that i am developing here is between using authenticity to denote membership in a certain type or identity (i.e., being a ‘real american’ as opposed being to an immigrant living in america), and to denote an honest or responsible relation to a certain type or identity (i.e., being an engaged american as opposed to being an apathetic american). 12 ibid. 94 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college components of one’s identity, it can be used to examine and evaluate cultures and individuals in a more pluralistic manner. pragmatist philosopher paul taylor has recently written an insightful book on the notion of black aesthetics, which i have found to complement glissant’s discussion of cultural hybridity and his rejection of authenticity qua legitimacy as a relevant notion for describing people as members of given races, ethnicities, or cultures. of course, authenticity qua legitimacy has appropriate and valid uses (i.e., is this an authentic bank note, or a fake?), but to use this notion to describe individuals’ identities is superfluous under the métissage framework, and, under the baroque framework, it designates individuals who are at cultural or ethnic crossroads as ‘fake’ or illegitimate members of a given race, ethnicity, or culture of which they are in fact a part. so, after discarding four permutations of this notion of authenticity, which are all quite similar to the notion that glissant seeks to discard, taylor offers a somewhat new notion that he calls, following the existential and phenomenological traditions, “experiential authenticity.”13 this form of authenticity complements glissant’s account in a manner similar to that of fanon’s, namely by emphasizing the contingency and context under which individual agents, such as jimi hendrix, undertake commitments and creative projects. for taylor, experiential authenticity is primarily “a heuristic device for action-guidance… to seek the right balance between facticity and transcendence.”14 he thus emphasizes the importance of responsibly engaging with one’s factical commitments in light of the possibility of moving beyond them through “creativity and choice,” which is to say that we are bound to both our chosen and non-chosen commitments.15 experiential authenticity ultimately deals with the ethical issues that become prevalent in light of cultural and ethnic hybridity. because we live “in a world of ceaseless cultural exchange,” where our roots often appear more nonexistent than rhizomatic, we need, for ethics, a notion of authenticity that allows us to take the facticity of our non-chosen roots seriously as we relate to and enmesh ourselves with others.16 while glissant demonstrates that cultural hybridity undermines many applications of authenticity qua legitimacy, taylor’s experiential authenticity helps us to ethically evaluate chosen entanglements in light of those non-chosen, while maintaining the hybridity of cultures. 13 paul c. taylor, black is beautiful: a philosophy of black aesthetics. (chichester, west sussex: wiley blackwell, 2016), p. 147. 14 ibid., p. 148. 15 ibid., p. 147. 16 ibid., p. 152. in describing our roots as rhizomatic, i mean that glissant, borrowing from the work of deleuze and guattari, understands that our ‘roots’ are multifarious, constantly developing, intertwined, and resistant to teleological readings, rather than as singular, mono-rooted or, otherwise, arborescent in nature. the main point here is that the force of cultural exchange today certainly exposes our constant development and our entanglement with others, but it often obscures the fact that we are rooted to anything at all (not sure what that means). rhizomatic roots thus accord with glissant’s insistence that one’s identity is hybridized, that is, not stemming from or being predicated by, a single root, which is inevitably entangled among the cultures and commitments with which one becomes involved. cf. darbinski, john e., levinas and the postcolonial: race, nation, other (edinburgh university press: edinburg, u.k., 2011), pp. 170-178. 95issue iv f spring 2017 jimi hendrix what glissant and taylor make clear is that we should not judge whether jimi hendrix, who had clearly made commitments far beyond those into which he was thrown, was legitimately or illegitimately black, but whether or not he responsibly engaged with his commitments, which include his own blackness. together with glissant’s notion of the métissage, this taylorian notion of authenticity allows us to embrace and judge creativity, not as a spirited-away, romantic ideal, but rather as a very real activity that entangles one in real, consequential commitments. jimi hendrix’s philosophy of race i argue that interpreting hendrix’s shifting negotiations between 1), a coldness towards his blackness, and 2), an embrace of it as simply a shift between not wanting and wanting to be black, does not go far enough in considering hendrix’s own view of what race is, among other factors. by coldness, i refer to hendrix’s ‘turning away’ from his blackness and his commitment to it, which i will demonstrate in the examples that follow. in light of taylor’s experiential authenticity, moreover, this coldness should be considered inauthentic, because hendrix did not responsibly engage with his own blackness, precisely by treating it as something to which he was not bound. hendrix’s philosophy of race, what paul gilroy somewhat misleadingly terms “the nomadic ideology of the gypsy,” could be understood as a way for him to rationalize his cold turning away from blackness, especially in the way that gilroy represents hendrix’s view17 as will be demonstrated, however, hendrix’s view of race should also be understood as allowing him to authentically embrace his blackness without reducing himself to it or ignoring his other commitments. thus, before proposing what hendrix’s view was and how it should be considered, it is necessary to substantiate the biographical claim that hendrix did in fact shift between avoidant rejection and authentic embrace of his blackness. to begin, hendrix has been quoted on multiple occasions making remarks that indicate his avoidance of blackness and his dismissal of the plights of african americans in the united states. hendrix once supposedly told a producer: “negros think they really have it bad, but indians [(native americans)] have it just as bad if not worse.”18 this remark touches on both indications noted above; hendrix identified with both his native american heritage and his african-american heritage, which set the grounds for him to distance himself from blackness and the ethical causes undertaken by african-americans. hendrix’s understanding of himself as multi-ethnic seems to have made him confused over his ethnic identity, a proposition supported by the testimony of linda keith, a girlfriend of keith richards and a close friend of 17 paul gilroy, the black atlantic: modernity and double-consciousness. (cambridge, massachusetts: harvard university press, 1993), p. 94. what is misleading about gilroy’s terminology is that it suggests rootlessness rather than rhizomatic roots. such a misunderstanding, however, may have been precisely what led hendrix to turn away from his blackness (though i make no claim that this is necessarily what happened). 18 charles gower price, “got my own world to look through: jimi hendrix and the blues aesthetic,” journal of american & comparative cultures, 25.3-4 (2002): p. 442. 96 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college hendrix.19 that is to say, hendrix’s self-understanding was incompatible with “[the law of ] the excluded middle of the american racial imagination,” not to mention that hendrix’s identity drew from outside the black-white binary altogether.20 thus, it is plausible that his distancing himself from blackness early in his career had more to do with do with the contrariety between the dominant structure of racial and ethnic interpellation (the baroque framework), which was ‘naturalized’ within the public sphere, and hendrix’s own understanding of race and ethnicity, which was informed by his experience of the contrariety of his double-consciousness. what i argue for here is that hendrix’s multi-ethnic self-conception and, consequently, the contrariety of his double-consciousness (seeing-himself-being-seen-as-black involving blackness as an over-simplified mislabel and an oppressive label) made it rather difficult, but not impossible, for him to develop a philosophy of race through which he could embrace his blackness without reducing himself to it. contrary to, and perhaps in explicit opposition to, the interpellating baroque essentialism that was diffuse in both white society and the black aesthetic movement, hendrix refused to “describe his music in race-specific terms.”21 that is, hendrix did not essentialize musical style to race, did not assert race-based ownership of style, nor did he see as valid the application of racial standards to music. case in point: as opposed to critics like amiri baraka who located the blues specifically in blackness, hendrix said that “everybody has some kind of blues to offer,” and heard ‘funkiness’ in both irish and african-american folk music alike.22 terms such as ‘funk’ and ‘blues’ have historically been associated so closely with african-american music-making that these remarks cannot but reveal hendrix’s refusal to valorize an ideology of race that seemed to limit his artistic endeavors, oppress his subjecthood, and misrepresent his identity. later in his career, there is evidence that hendrix came to more closely identify with his blackness and embrace the related responsibility that he had been avoiding, though the topic of race still appears to have been uncomfortable for him to talk about. three biographical facts elucidate this point. first, during a trip to morocco, hendrix was comforted by the fact that his race was not causing him to be interpellated as subsubject, and that his fame did not subsume how others perceived him: he immersed himself in the music and mysticism of the moroccan culture around him without the active presence of double-consciousness that had been infringing on his identity.23 second, shortly after the woodstock festival, hendrix had agreed to perform a benefit concert in harlem for the united block association (uba). he was nervous 19 ibid., p. 443; charles r. cross, room full of mirrors: a biography of jimi hendrix. (new york: hyperion, 2005). 20 christopher waterman, “race music: bo chatmon, “corrine corrina,” and the excluded middle,” music and the racial imagination, ronald radano and philip v. bohlman, eds. (chicago, il: university of chicago press, 2000), p. 198. 21 steve waksman, “black sound, black body: jimi hendrix, the electric guitar, and the meanings of blackness,” popular music and society, 23.1 (1999): p. 86. 22 ibid., 87. 23 charles r. cross, room full of mirrors: a biography of jimi hendrix, pp. 264-265. 97issue iv f spring 2017 jimi hendrix about recognizing that his fan-base was largely white and that he had minimal, if any, presence on black radio stations, but, nevertheless, was rather optimistic about the event: he was moved by “the nonviolent nature of woodstock and hoped the uba show would bring that same sense of unity to harlem.”24 even though hendrix was shying away from talking about race in a follow-up interview, there is a clear sense that he wanted to responsibly engage with the african-american community, typified by his emphasis on: non-violence, providing opportunities for the underprivileged, and his avoidance of reducing musical forms to essentialized race-music; here his remarks on musical style are basically consistent with his earlier remarks on both the blues and funk.25 lastly, although hendrix’s strong advocacy for non-violence had led him to distance himself from the black panthers throughout his career, by 1970 he had gone so far as to call “voodoo child (slight return)” “our anthem,” which he then dedicated to “the people’s park and especially the black panthers [second emphasis added].”26 thus, despite his refusal to speak of music in racial terms, it appears that he felt obligated to reach out to the african-american community; although he had knowingly alienated himself from this community, his commitment to the ideals of the rainbow movement—such as peace, open-mindedness, and diversity—would be a sham—a mere act of posturing—had he not seriously engaged with the african-american community, at the very least because the rainbow movement was heavily implicated in the civil rights movement. accordingly, hendrix’s view of himself as ‘black-butnot-only-black’ along with his rainbow ethics should be understood as critical for his turn towards positively engaging with the african-american community. further, by 1970, racial politics had reached a point at which one could not be flippant about one’s identity; accordingly, hendrix was berated by many members of the africanamerican community for his history of turning-away from his blackness and his responsibility to it. however, it is clear that hendrix had, by this time and for a manifold of reasons, come to recognize that he had an ethical responsibly engage with his blackness. in light of experiential authenticity, one might say that hendrix came to realize that he had a commitment to the african-american community that no amount of branching out could eliminate. although he was far from an exemplary representative of the african-american community and an activist for their causes, he came to face and take seriously his responsibility to the african-american community, in addition to his other, chosen responsibilities, both related and unrelated. my argument thus builds upon steve waksman’s argument that “musical and racial boundaries (which intersect in the division, say, between “real” blues and “white” blues, or between blues and rock) appeared to hendrix to be similarly artificial constructs” by emphasizing the boundaries as illegitimate, and the standard modes of judging 24 ibid., p. 274. 25 ibid., p. 274-75. in an interview with the new york times before the event, hendrix said that he “want[ed] to show them that music is universal—that there is no white rock or black rock.” 26 ibid., p. 296. 98 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college authenticity—and of using authenticity qua legitimacy as an evaluative tool—as antagonistic towards his artistic proclivities.27 through his ethnic identification and imaginative stylization, jimi hendrix reveals himself as something of a glissantian, whose identity and authenticity-grounds are ill-suited for, and misrepresented by, the essentialist presuppositions of the baroque ideology. accordingly, hendrix—the person and the artist—should be studied through the métissage framework. jimi’s creole imagination and experiential authenticity by adopting the métissage framework of cultural relation to analyze jimi hendrix as a reflexively hybrid artist rather than a ‘crossover’ artist, we can better understand his creative development and evaluate his cultural agency. the métissage holds that cultures and cultural agents have rhizomatic roots, such that they are hybrid and multi-rooted rather than rootless; further, cultures and cultural agents can expand their roots be relating to others. this process of relation is generative and imaginative whilst also being contingent to prior roots, both chosen and non-chosen. thus, when glissant treats imagination as “inexhaustible,” he is referring to the fact that relation is something of an extropy, wherein cultures and cultural agents become more diverse and more complex, along with their imaginative potentials.28 i hold that this cultural extropy increases the contingencies of a given imagination as well as its possibilities. in light of the cultural extropy and rhizomatic contingencies that are revealed through the métissage, the phenomenon of jimi hendrix—as both man and artist—becomes much more coherent. here we have a black musician with a multi-ethnic heritage who took an active role in his subject formation. although he was interpellated as black in manners that were at times advantageous (in london) and at times disadvantageous (in the u.s.), his active subject formation was fueled and conditioned by the interaction between the multifarious experimentation of the rainbow movement and his self-understanding as culturally and ethnically hybrid. hendrix’s ‘creole imagination’, as i have termed it, should thus not be understood as “free play of the imagination,” as waksman puts it, à la kant, which implies that the imagination is an autonomous, non-contingent form of freedom.29 here i strongly disagree with waksman, and instead suggest an understanding of creole imagination as a contingent form of imagination that increases its contingencies and expands its possibilities as it entangles itself with the manifold set of possibilities that it discovers and engages with. to apply waksman’s notion to hendrix, we see that hendrix began his musical development with the blues tradition, which is entangled with african27 waksman, “black sound, black body: jimi hendrix, the electric guitar, and the meanings of blackness,” p. 88. i have omitted waksman’s appeal to the “free play of the imagination,” which i reject as an antiquated appeal to the arts and imagination as autonomous and non-contingent. i briefly argue against it and offer my alternative understanding of imagination in the following section. 28 glissant, poetics of relation, p. 95. 29 waksman, “black sound, black body: jimi hendrix, the electric guitar, and the meanings of blackness,” p. 88. 99issue iv f spring 2017 jimi hendrix american culture, but throughout his career, he engaged with a number of other musical styles and cultural movements, which, in turn, expanded his imaginative horizon while entangling him in further commitments and contingencies. for example, once hendrix aligned himself with the rainbow movement and the hippie counterculture, his subsequent actions became entangled with these commitments, and could then be evaluated on this basis. nevertheless, both his ethnic hybridity and his blackness were contingencies for him both prior to and after these commitments, and should thus be understood as conditions in which he engaged in his reflexive stylization. from the aforementioned biographical points, it is clear that hendrix did not responsibly consider his blackness as a contingent commitment until the near-end of his life, though the responsibility was there to be considered and acted upon all along. when he did responsibly engage with his blackness, however, he did so in a way that was simultaneously both responsible for and considerate of his rainbow commitments; when he was in harlem to help the uba, he championed nonviolence and also refused to essentialize music as race-music, all while working to positively influence the local youth, who were systematically impoverished and racially-targeted. at this point, by coherently and responsibly negotiating with his commitments, hendrix had come to exhibit an experiential authenticity that he had not demonstrated beforehand. perhaps a sort of crowning-jewel with which we can conclude this analysis of jimi hendrix’s relationship to blackness is a separate analysis of his song, “voodoo child (slight return),” in light of his dedication of a performance of the song to the black panthers, which marks a consummation of his hybrid, reflexive stylization with his turn towards experiential authenticity. “voodoo child (slight return)” demonstrates how hendrix’s style has its basis in the blues, but stretches far beyond this basis. even before hendrix began to relate authentically to his blackness, he used the term ‘voodoo’ as homage to a spiritual tradition found in a number of african and afro-diasporic cultures. additionally, the lyrics of the song follow the traditional blues, aab form. following the song’s lyrics, hendrix proclaims himself a ‘voodoo child’ with masculine, spiritual power that extends from this world to ‘the next’; the voodoo child chops down mountains with his hand, reassembles these mountains to create an island, and erects sand from beneath the ocean (though this last line could also be read as expressing a sort of ‘shaking things up’). after lyrically expressing his power, hendrix “plays a searing solo on the upper registers of his instrument” that wails with pitch bends and disorientingly swells with ‘wah’ sounds and automated panning30 in the following verse, hendrix’s lyrics come quite closer to those of a traditional blues, where he apologizes for taking up somebody’s time (perhaps a woman’s), and promises to make it up to this person; his manner of reparation, however, returns to the spiritual and the mystical by evoking an otherworldly meeting. in professing his intention to return the time in the ‘next’ world, hendrix makes it an imperative to not be late, 30 ibid., p. 91. 100 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college which may be to signify his persuasive power as a voodoo child, though the reason for the imperative admittedly remains unclear. on a number of grounds, however, the song captures the multiplicity of hendrix’s hybrid style. it is bluesy, but not only so. it exploits both the material and the ephemeral possibilities afforded by the electric guitar. it incorporates both chaotic noise and articulate musical phrasing. ultimately, by non-reductively fusing these elements without attention to false contradictions, misattributed incoherencies, and the law of the excluded racial-middle that had linked race and music by essentializing black and white cultural production, hendrix demonstrates his commitment to exposing boundaries as altogether illegitimate and as oppressive to those at the crossroads. only after re-aligning himself with the african-american cause, however, does he demonstrate an understanding that the essentialism and boundary-forging of the baroque are oppressive to those on the ‘wrong side’ of the boundary as well. ultimately, it is at this point, and not beforehand, that hendrix could be considered experientially authentic. conclusion by dedicating a hybrid, experimental blues song to the black panthers, hendrix shows us that his commitment to and identification with creolization could be compatible with a commitment to the african-american community, and that hybridity and blackness need not be mutually exclusive. the cultural and political climate of the early-1960’s allowed hendrix to experiment while downplaying his identity, but there were clear changes on a number of fronts as the decade came to a close. martin luther king jr. and malcolm x were both assassinated, nixon had set his sights on the black panthers in his ‘law and order’ campaign, and there were riots, by both blacks and whites, over race relations across the country. racial identification had become a much more serious matter that could no longer be ‘escaped’. hendrix clearly had to face this reality and, consequently, had come to the side of black america. following taylor, i hold that hendrix had come to relate authentically to his blackness at this point, which he did not seem to do in the early 1960’s. the rapid cultural change during the rainbow movement had covered up the contingency of one’s roots, however rhizomatic they may be. knowing that hendrix was, for most of his life, far from a moral exemplar in his engagement with blackness, it is critical that we consider his philosophy of race not to justify his irresponsibility, but to understand it as deeply woven between his worldview and the historical situation in which he was thrown. i do not believe there can be a moral justification for hendrix’s cold neglect of his responsibilities as an african-american, but by probing into his views on race, his involvement in the rainbow movement, and his turn towards authentically engaging with his commitment to blackness, we can begin to see why his relation to blackness was as enigmatic, complex, and shifting as it was. f 101issue iv f spring 2017 jimi hendrix bibliography baraka, amiri. blues people: negro music in white america. new york: w. morrow, 1963. cross, charles r. room full of mirrors: a biography of jimi hendrix. new york: hyperion, 2005. gilroy, paul. the black atlantic: modernity and double consciousness. cambridge, massachusetts: harvard university press, 1993. glissant, édouard. poetics of relation. translated by betsy wing, ann arbor: university of michigan press, 1997. macherey, pierre. “figures of interpellation in althusser and fanon.” radical philosophy, 173.9 (2012): pp. 1-20. price, charles gower. “got my own world to look through: jimi hendrix and the blues aesthetic.” journal of american & comparative cultures, 25.3-4 (2002): pp. 442–446. taylor, paul c. black is beautiful: a philosophy of black aesthetics. chichester, west sussex: wiley blackwell, 2016. waksman, steve. “black sound, black body: jimi hendrix, the electric guitar, and the meanings of blackness.” popular music and society, 23.1 (1999): pp. 75-113. waterman, christopher. “race music: bo chatmon, “corrine corrina,” and the excluded middle.” in music and the racial imagination, edited by ronald radano and philip v. bohlman, pp. 167-205. chicago, il: university of chicago press, 2000. 66 δι αν οι α is geometry analytic? mghanga david mwakima 1. introduction in the fourth chapter of language, truth and logic, ayer undertakes the task of showing how a priori knowledge of mathematics and logic is possible. in doing so, he argues that only if we understand mathematics and logic as analytic,1 by which he memorably meant “devoid of factual content”2, do we have a justified account of a priori knowledge of these disciplines.3 in this chapter, it is not clear whether ayer gives an argument per se for the analyticity of mathematics and logic. for when one reads that chapter, one sees that ayer is mainly criticizing the views held by kant and mill with respect to arithmetic.4 nevertheless, i believe that the positive argument is present. ayer’s discussion of geometry5 in this chapter shows that it is this discussion which constitutes his positive argument for the thesis that analytic sentences are true 1 now, i am aware that ‘analytic’ was understood differently by kant, carnap, ayer, quine, and putnam. it is not even clear whether there is even an agreed definition of ‘analytic’ today. for the purposes of my paper, the meaning of ‘analytic’ is carnap’s sense as described in: michael, friedman, reconsidering logical positivism (new york: cambridge university press, 1999), in terms of the relativized a priori. 2 alfred jules, ayer, language, truth and logic (new york: dover publications, 1952), p. 79, 87. in these sections of the book, i think the reason ayer chose to characterize analytic statements as “devoid of factual” content is in order to give an account of why analytic statements could not be shown to be false on the basis of observation. in other words, the reason why the analytic statements were necessary truths, according to ayer, is that they did not assert that which required further facts or observation in order to establish their truth. one just needed to know the “meanings” or definitions of the terms in those statements in order to “see” that they are true independent of further observation or empirical data. for example, it is a fact that ‘euclidean triangle’ refers to a planar three-sided figure. and it is a fact that every euclidean triangle has angles adding up to 180 degrees. but given these facts, it follows that every planar three-sided figure has angles adding up to 180 degrees without need of any further observation. so, ‘every planar three-sided figure has angles adding up to 180 degrees,’ is an analytic statement in ayer’s sense of ‘analytic’. 3 ayer, language, truth and logic, p. 73. 4 kant believed arithmetic is synthetic a priori while mill believed that we arrive at mathematical beliefs on the basis of scientific induction. see ayer, language, truth and logic, p. 74 – 75; 77 – 78. 5 ayer, language, truth and logic, p. 82. 67issue iv f spring 2017 is geometry analytic in virtue of the definitions of the terms in them and are thus “devoid of factual content”. what follows is a summary of the argument that ayer makes in his discussion of geometry. suppose, as kant believed in his critique of pure reason, that euclidean geometry is synthetic a priori. on the one hand, euclidean geometry is synthetic because one could not, by conceptual analysis alone, arrive at the truths of euclidean geometry. moreover, since geometry is synthetic, unlike analytic judgments (which, according to kant, do not amplify [or increase] our knowledge), geometry does indeed increase our knowledge. on the other hand, euclidean geometry is a priori, for it is grounded in our a priori idea of space, which, for kant, was the pure form of sensible intuition. the idea of space itself is a priori (in the transcendental sense) insofar as it is only if we have that idea, due to the unfathomable constitution of our mind, is any experience possible. but, since kant’s critique of pure reason, other consistent (and practically useful) non-euclidean geometries6 have been developed. thus, it cannot be the case that euclidean geometry is synthetic a priori in kant’s sense or that its a priori status is due to the constitution of our mind. “we see now,” ayer says, “that the axioms of a geometry are simply definitions, and that the theorems of a geometry are simply the logical consequences of these definitions. a geometry is not in itself about physical space; in itself it cannot be said to be “about” anything. but we can use a geometry to reason about physical space.”7 fast-forward about 30 years later to hilary putnam. in a chapter entitled “analytic and synthetic,” in his book mind, language and reality, putnam, (somewhat) following quine,8 argues that principles of geometry are not analytic if the paradigmatic analytic sentence is ‘all bachelors are unmarried’. apart from the separate reasons, of which i shall not speak here, that putnam gives for the analyticity of ‘all bachelors are unmarried,’ there are other reasons that he uses to argue that principles of geometry are not analytic. first of all, he rejects the “linguistic convention” account of analyticity that some philosophers were using to argue that the principles of geometry, like physical definitions (e.g., e=1/2 mv^2), are true by (linguistic) convention or stipulation, and hence analytic.9 putnam argues that these definitions introduced by stipulation lose their conventional character and acquire systematic import within our conceptual system in such a way that it would be a mistake to construe them as analytic if analyticity is understood to mean ‘true by linguistic convention or stipulation.’10 secondly (and this is where putnam’s acceptance duhemian and quinean holism11 is very evident), mathematics and principles of 6 for example, einstein used a non-euclidean geometry to describe space-time in his formulation of the general theory of relativity. 7 ayer, language, truth and logic, p. 82. 8 cf. hilary, putnam, “analytic and synthetic” printed in mind, language, and reality (hilary, putnam philosophical papers vol. 2) (new york: cambridge university press, 1975) p. 40. 9 putnam, “analytic and synthetic”, pp. 36, 38ff. 10 ibid. 11 see friedman, reconsidering logical positivism p. 70 for further discussion of duhemian and quinean holism. 68 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college geometry are characterized by their centrality, as framework principles, within our web of beliefs – revisable but only after holistic considerations. thus, principles of euclidean geometry, once thought to be analytic (in the sense of ‘immune from revision’), were abandoned because a rival theory was available.12 what is intriguing, especially in light of ayer’s argument, is putnam’s conclusion that euclidean geometry is false (my emphasis): if the paradigm for an analytic sentence is “all bachelors are unmarried” and it is then it is of course absurd to say that the principles of geometry are analytic. indeed we cannot any longer say that the principles of geometry are analytic; because analytic sentences are true; and we no longer say that principles of euclidean geometry are true.13 in this paper, i will attempt to answer the question: is geometry analytic and in what sense? in doing so, i will begin by critically evaluating ayer and putnam’s arguments on the analyticity (or lack thereof ) of geometry on the basis of historico-philosophical work on the foundations of geometry by roberto torretti in philosophy of geometry from riemann to poincaré and michael friedman in reconsidering logical positivism. my critical evaluations of ayer and putnam will show that in their arguments against kant and linguistic conventionalism respectively, they fail to distinguish clearly between what einstein called “pure axiomatic geometry” and “practical geometry.”14 on the one hand, i will show that ayer fails to notice that kant could have been talking about ‘pure geometry,’ and not ‘applied geometry,’ when kant argued that geometry is synthetic a priori. on the other hand, i will show that putnam fails to distinguish between applied euclidean geometry and pure euclidean geometry in the quoted passage. after my critical evaluations of ayer and putnam’s arguments, i will conclude by suggesting how someone could plausibly think that applied euclidean geometry is analytic in carnap’s sense. i will be drawing from friedman’s reconsidering logical positivism in my presentation of carnap’s sense of ‘analytic.’ friedman argues in that book that carnap can accept duhemian holism while still rejecting quinean holism. “to obtain quinean holism,” friedman says, “we must exhibit the incoherence of carnap’s logical syntax program, and only this, i suggest, demonstrates the ultimate failure of the logical positivists’ version of the relativized a priori [my emphasis].”15 12 putnam, “analytic and synthetic”, pp. 47ff. 13 ibid. 14 see albert, einstein, sidelights on relativity (new york: dover, 1983), p. 32. i thank peter koellner for suggesting this approach to my paper. i think ‘pure geometry’ is a better term than ‘pure axiomatic geometry.’ pure axiomatic geometry implies that all the pure geometries are approached axiomatically which is not necessarily the case. also, ‘applied geometry’ sounds more accurate than ‘practical geometry’; for it suggests that what we are talking about is pure geometry as it is applied to the study of physical space or in physics, e.g., in optics. in this paper, i may sometimes use the terms ‘physical geometry’ and ‘applied geometry’ interchangeably. 15 cf. friedman, reconsidering logical positivism, p. 70 69issue iv f spring 2017 is geometry analytic 2. pure geometry and applied geometry on the one hand, what i choose to call ‘pure geometry’ is geometry studied as a branch of pure mathematics. specifically, i take pure geometry to include classical euclidean geometry as say: that which was pursued in classical antiquity and through the middle ages in euclid’s elements; the analytical coordinate geometry invented by rené descartes in the 17th century, the non-euclidean geometries 16developed independently by bolyai and lobachevsky in the 1820s; gauss’s intrinsic geometry of surfaces in his disquisitions of 1827, which, together with the earlier non-euclidean geometries of bolyai and lobachevsky influenced riemann in his 1854 lecture: on the hypotheses that lie at the foundations of geometry to come up with a generalized conception of space as a n-fold extended quantity i.e. an n-dimensional differentiable manifold – a conception which could accommodate both the euclidean and noneuclidean geometries. i would also include under pure geometry, the work of felix klein and sophus lie on transformation groups; projective geometry, which was axiomatized by moritz pasch in 1882; and the axiomatic conception of euclidean geometry and both euclidean and non-euclidean geometry found in david hilbert’s 1899 foundations of geometry and 1902 article “on the foundations of geometry” respectively.17 topology can also be classed within the study of pure geometry. pure geometry is a priori in both senses of the term: “known independent of experience” and “[demonstrated] from the grounds.”18 but as we shall subsequently see in this paper, saying why pure geometry is a priori generates a lot of controversy. on the other hand, what i call ‘applied geometry’ is geometry in the literal sense of the term, i.e., “earth measuring.”19 applied geometry arises whenever the formal terms in pure geometry receive a physical interpretation i.e. when their designata are specified for use in the exact sciences like physics. in classical mechanics, for example, euclidean geometry was used in kinematics by “building bridge equations”20 from pure euclidean geometry to physics. these ‘bridge equations’ are such as those that grew out of descartes’s analytic geometry, where he introduced coordinate systems and algebra to geometry (e.g., the equation of a straight line [ax + by + c = 0]), which found fruitful application in analysis and subsequently in kinematics. i think that 16 cf. roberto, torretti, philosophy of geometry from riemann to poincaré (dordrecht-holland; boston: d. reidel pub., 1978) chapter 1 and 2 and 3. see torretti, philosophy of geometry from riemann to poincaré, p. 185 for hilbert’s works. 17 torretti also points out the work of levi-cività in the geometric meaning of curvature and that of weyl with the idea of an affine structure. so, we may include their contributions as contributions to pure geometry. 18 the “from the grounds” sense of the a priori comes from the theory of demonstration. in peter koellner’s seminar class: topics in the philosophy of mathematics: the concept of apriority (philosophy 243, fall 2015), for which i wrote this paper, koellner had shown that ‘a priori’ did not always mean what it means today, i.e., “known independent of experience”. ‘a priori [demonstration]’ was used earlier by william of ockham (ca. 13 century) when he distinguishes: (1) demonstration from what is prior, i.e., why it is so from explanatory grounds; from (2) demonstration from what is posterior, i.e., that it is so. he cited ockham’s summa logicae part iii tractate ii chapter 17. this sense of ‘a priori’, peter argued in seminar, can serve to illuminate certain accounts of justifications in mathematics. 19 see einstein, sidelights on relativity, p. 31 20 this is a term that peter koellner explicitly in his presentation during this seminar class. since i was submitting this paper for that class, i wanted to acknowledge that it is not my own. 70 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college physical geometry in classical mechanics was still a priori, for i do not think that ‘straight line’ had received a physical interpretation in optics. however, in general relativity, the apriority of physical geometry gets lost as physical geometry becomes entangled with the physical structure of the universe, especially with the distribution of mass and energy in the universe. for in general relativity, the metric of the underlying topology of space-time depends on the distribution of mass-energy across the universe.21 specifically, if a geodesic (which is the non-euclidean equivalent of the straight line in euclidean geometry) in a 4-dimensional semi-riemannian manifold of non-constant curvature is interpreted as the path of an unimpeded beam of light, then the physical structure of the universe is such that two unimpeded parallel beams of light can converge globally (if not locally or infinitesimally) as they go past a star.22 3. critical evaluation of ayer armed with this distinction between pure geometry and applied geometry, i would now like to engage in critical evaluation of ayer’s argument in the fourth chapter of language truth and logic. one way of critically evaluating ayer’s argument is to ask whether the argument works in refuting kant’s epistemology of geometry as ayer intended. with respect to this aspect of critical evaluation, the first point i want to make is that ayer is correct in saying that “a geometry is not in itself about physical space:23 in itself it cannot be said to be “about” anything.” he is correct insofar as he is talking about pure geometry as i have distinguished it above; however, i do not believe that this particular argument succeeds in refuting kant’s thesis that geometry is synthetic a priori. first, for kant, the ‘synthetic’ had a primary sense and a secondary sense. the primary sense of ‘synthetic’ is well known. it is roughly the idea that a judgment is synthetic whenever the predicate ‘b’ of a judgment is not contained (covertly) in the subject ‘a’ of the judgment. so, one can think of ‘a’ without necessarily thinking of ‘b.’ or, put another way, mere conceptual analysis does not reveal that the predicate ‘b’ was contained in subject ‘a’ all along. the secondary sense of the synthetic is that while analytic judgments are explicative, which means that they reveal the concepts already contained in the subject albeit confusedly or less clearly; synthetic judgments are ampliative, which means that synthetic judgments extend our knowledge.24 secondly, the ‘a priori’ also had two distinct senses for kant. firstly, whatever was a priori was both necessary and had universal validity. secondly, whatever was a priori was so in a transcendental sense, meaning that it arose out of the unfathomable constitution of our mind insofar as it made experience possible. the implication 21 cf. friedman, reconsidering logical positivism, pp. 62. 22 i thank peter koellner for fruitful discussion of these points as i was writing this paper in fall 2015. 23 cf. friedman, reconsidering logical positivism, pp. 46f for the distinctions that carnap drew between formal, intuitive and physical space. 24 cf. immanuel, kant, critique of pure reason (smith norman k., trans.) (china: palgrave macmillan, 2007) (2nd edition: original work published in german 1787) introduction part iv p. 48f. 71issue iv f spring 2017 is geometry analytic here being that whatever makes experience possible cannot itself be known through experience.25 on the basis of these clarifications, i want to argue that ayer’s argument that seeks to refute kant’s epistemology of geometry in terms of geometry not being “about” anything, does not succeed. to see why, recall that for ayer a proposition has factual content if and only if it “provides information about matters of fact.”26 elsewhere, he says that propositions that have factual content are empirical hypotheses.27 so, when ayer says (emphasis mine), “[it] is natural for us to think, as kant thought, that geometry is the study of the properties of physical space, and consequently that its propositions have factual content,” i am at a loss as to why. there is no evidence in kant’s critique to suggest that kant’s view of geometry was such that the propositions of geometry expressed empirical hypotheses. in fact, kant is very clear: geometrical propositions are one and all apodeitic…such propositions cannot be empirical or, in other words, judgments of experience, nor can they be derived from any such judgments.28 it may be objected that in the context of the quoted passage kant says that, “geometry is a science which determines the properties of space synthetically, and yet a priori.” this objection may be put forward to suggest that the term ‘science’ and the clause ‘determines the properties of space synthetically’ together imply that, for kant, geometry is empirical and that it is about something (that it has factual content and that this content is physical space). couldn’t this, after all, be what ayer is objecting to? my response is yes: ayer is objecting to this view. however, ayer’s objection does not work for the following reasons. first, the quotation from kant does not establish that the propositions of geometry are empirical hypotheses. that geometry is a ‘science’ could just mean that it is a systematically organized body of knowledge, which is just what a science means. pure mathematics is also sometimes viewed as a science in the sense of being a systematically organized body of knowledge. secondly, the quoted passage does not imply that the space in question is actual physical space. in fact, that the passage does not imply physical space is strongly suggested by the fact that part of what kant has in mind throughout the transcendental aesthetic is arriving at our idea of space. this idea of space – as a form of our sensible intuition – is a priori in the transcendental sense. so, if geometry is about this a priori idea, then it cannot be the case that in the quoted passage the space in question is physical space. lastly, ‘synthetically,’ for kant, does not mean that synthetic judgments are known by experience; for, after all, there are synthetic a priori judgments. the right 25 cf. kant, critique of pure reason (smith norman k., trans.) introduction part ii p. 43f and p. 70f and friedman, reconsidering logical positivism, p. 7. 26 ayer, language, truth and logic, p. 79 27 ibid., p. 15 17. 28 cf. kant, critique of pure reason (smith norman k., trans.) p. 70 72 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college way of interpreting ‘synthetically’ is in the primary and secondary senses of synthetic judgments that i have described above.29 what the foregoing aspect of critical evaluation shows is that one cannot explain away ayer’s overthrow of kant’s epistemology of geometry by saying that ayer is talking about pure geometry while kant is talking about applied geometry. the passages from kant i have quoted above strongly suggest that kant possibly had pure geometry in mind. the way that ayer’s argument does succeed is in challenging the grounds of the apriority of geometry. while kant grounds the apriority of geometrical propositions on the a priori idea of space that arises as a result of the constitution of our mind, ayer believes that a geometry is a priori because it is analytic (though not in kant’s sense of the term). moreover, since kant’s time, there have been other consistent theories of pure geometry other than the classical euclidean one that was the only one known to him. for within these geometrical theories, the theorems are logical consequences of the axioms and so these theories are all a priori because they are analytic. it is on this basis that ayer is able to endorse the conventionalism of poincaré in the quoted passage: roughly, that the idea that the choice of a pure geometry to be applied in physical theory is a matter of convention based on expediency and the overall fruitfulness and simplicity of working with the said geometry.30 the conventionalism of poincaré will be better appreciated in the context of critical evaluation of putnam’s essay. in that essay, putnam targets the linguistic conventionalism. although some logical positivists (especially moritz schlick) were inspired by poincaré’s conventionalism, the linguistic conventionalism advocated by carnap is unique and has important differences from the conventionalism of poincaré. 4. critical evaluation of putnam 4.1 why was euclidean geometry abandoned? i begin my critical evaluation of putnam’s essay by looking at where putnam says that the laws of geometry were abandoned because there was a rival theory.31 here we make use of our distinction between pure geometry and applied geometry. while it is true to say that when euclidean geometry is applied to our physical space, it turns out to be incorrect; it does not follow that pure euclidean geometry itself is false and that it was abandoned. viewed historico-philosophically, what actually happened is that geometers doubted that postulate 5 was self-evident, and hence they doubted that it ought to be included with the rest of euclid’s axioms. torretti points out that mathematicians like proclus, john wallis, girolamo saccheri, john heinrich lambert and adrien legendre made attempts to prove postulate 5 from the 29 cf. kant, critique of pure reason (smith norman k., trans.) p. 53. 30 ayer, language, truth and logic, p. 83. 31 putnam, “analytic and synthetic”, pp. 46, 48. 73issue iv f spring 2017 is geometry analytic other axioms.32 although gauss thought that there were no mathematical reasons for preferring euclidean geometry to the non-euclidean one,33 it was in the 1820s that bolyai and lobachevsky, working independently of each other, developed noneuclidean geometry, which was constructed by denying postulate 5 and using the rest of euclid’s axioms that do not depend on postulate 5. 34lobachevsky indeed did not view his system as contrary to euclidean geometry. he viewed both systems as equally consistent.35 then riemann, by building on gauss’s work on the intrinsic geometry of surfaces, produced a generalized geometry capable of accommodating both the euclidean and non-euclidean geometries – euclidean space is a special case of the genus of the manifold.36 moreover, where putnam says, “before the development of non-euclidean geometry by riemann and lobachevski, the best philosophic minds regarded the principles of geometry as virtually analytic. the human mind could not conceive their falsity.” putnam’s remarks need to be corrected in light of what actually happened historicophilosophically. if, by the best philosophic minds he counts kant, then kant did not regard the principles of geometry as analytic. for kant, principles of geometry were synthetic a priori. it is important to distinguish analyticity from apriority. analyticity is one way of explaining the apriority of mathematics and geometry. in fact, given my discussion in section 3 above, kant’s epistemology of geometry is compatible with the existence of non-euclidean geometries. friedman points out that the only difference between poincaré and kant is that the former was familiar with noneuclidean geometry, while the latter was not.37 4.2 the rationale of the analytic-synthetic distinction a second way we may critically evaluate putnam’s argument is with the preliminary remarks leading up to his discussion of the analyticity (or lack thereof ) of principles of geometry. one such remark he makes is intended to defend the quinean insight that he thinks is underappreciated by the philosophers who undertake to challenge quine’s views. putnam thinks that citing garden-variety examples of analyticity will not do as a reply to quine. instead, he insists that what is needed is a definition of the nature and rationale of the analytic-synthetic distinction: “what point is there to having a separate class of statements called analytic statements?”38 so thus, we may begin our critical evaluation of putnam’s view here, by responding to this question historico-philosophically. 32 torretti, philosophy of geometry from riemann to poincaré, pp. 43, 44, 50. 33 ibid., p. 53. 34 ibid., p. 40. 35 ibid,, p. 66. 36 torretti, philosophy of geometry from riemann to poincaré, p. 101. 37 friedman, reconsidering logical positivism, p. 83. 38 putnam, “analytic and synthetic”, p. 35 74 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college on the one hand, i believe that the nature and rationale of the analytic-synthetic distinction lie in the fact that the logical positivists in general, and carnap in particular, wanted to respond to the kantian problem: how is pure mathematics possible?39 in doing so, they also wanted to avoid the kantian synthetic a priori doctrine of the transcendental aesthetic.40 since putnam directs some of his criticisms of the analyticity of geometry towards reichenbach,41 whose conventionalism, he says, grew out of the viennese circle, seeing what reichenbach actually thought at one time in his career will serve us well as we seek to understand the nature and rationale of the analytic-synthetic distinction. 4.3 the relativized a priori as friedman points out, reichenbach had a unique conception of the relationship between the a priori and empirical science that was neither strictly kantian nor radically empiricist.42 friedman argues in his 1920 book, general relativity and a priori knowledge, that reichenbach distinguished between axioms of coordination and axioms of connection.43 on the one hand, the axioms of coordination preserved part of the kantian sense of the a priori, namely that they make science, through the physical theory, possible. he held that whatever the axioms of coordination were, they were a priori relative to the scientific theory that was employing them. friedman notes that, for reichenbach, “these nonempirical axioms of coordination – which include, paradigmatically, the principles of physical geometry – are ‘constitutive of the object of knowledge.’”44 axioms of connection, on the other hand, are scientific inductive generalizations. what is important to note, according to friedman, is that for reichenbach, the axioms of coordination, relative to a given scientific theory (newtonian mechanics, special relativity, or general relativity), are a priori and, as such, are not subject to any empirical confirmation or disconfirmation. but whichever axioms of coordination are in fact used depends on the scientific theory. so, the axioms of coordination could, in principle, be revised as a result of scientific advances, e.g., physical euclidean geometry is a priori in classical mechanics but is not a priori in general relativity, where “topology (sufficient to admit a riemannian structure)” is instead a priori.45 this is the relativized a priori – the idea that relative to a scientific theory, a geometry, for example, is a priori. friedman notes that schlick, in an exchange of letters, rebuked reichenbach for holding on to elements of the kantian doctrine. instead, schlick wanted reichenbach to adopt the conventionalism of poincaré. by acquiescing to schlick, the notion of 39 friedman, reconsidering logical positivism, p. 165. 40 cf. ayer, language, truth and logic, p. chapter 4 and friedman, reconsidering logical positivism, pp. 165 and kant, critique of pure reason (smith norman k., trans.) p. 56. 41 putnam, “analytic and synthetic”, pp. 33, 47. 42 friedman, reconsidering logical positivism, p. 7. 43 ibid. 44 friedman, reconsidering logical positivism, p. 7. 45 ibid., p. 7 and especially pp. 66 – 68. 75issue iv f spring 2017 is geometry analytic relativized a priori was lost.46 later, as friedman points out, reichenbach devoted his writing to reconciling post-general relativity science to the conventionalism of schlick and poincaré.47 schlick’s conventionalism grew out of that of poincaré and the work of david hilbert. from the former, schlick was persuaded that the question of which of the geometries is to be applied to space is a matter to be settled by experience and requirements of overall simplicity of our scientific conceptual system. applying the helmholtzlie theorem, which states that based on the experience (or idealization in the case of poincaré) that rigid motion is possible in our space, our space must be either euclidean or characterized by one of the manifolds of constant curvature,48 poincaré thought that the choice between the non-euclidean and euclidean geometries was conventional based on which was the most expedient to work with.49 from hilbert, schlick got the idea of ‘implicit definitions’, namely that the axioms of a geometry implicitly define the geometry’s primitive terms. different geometries differ in so far as they employ different implicit definitions of ‘point,’ ‘line,’ ‘between,’ and so on. as friedman points out, the conventionalism of poincaré and schlick is in no way different from duhemian holism, which is the idea that the theoretical components of our conceptual system face the tribunal of experience not in isolation, but as a whole.50 so, schlick’s conventionalism does not do justice to the principles of geometry and differs from the linguistic conventionalism of carnap that i shall now proceed to explain. 4.4 linguistic conventionalism according to friedman, where reichenbach had failed to give a clear explication of the difference between the axioms of coordination and the axioms of connection, carnap, in the logical syntax of language, had the machinery to do so: l-rules51 (the analytic) and p-rules (the synthetic) of the physical language of science. the choice of l-rules and the interpretation that made them true is a matter of convention, for these rules are purely formal and one has a lot of leeway in selecting the l-rules in the formulation of a language. in classical mechanics, for example, the l-rules include the principles of euclidean geometry, while the p-rules are the general principles and laws of physics. in general relativity, the l-rules include a topology sufficient 46 ibid., pp. 64 this is important because putnam, in “analytic and synthetic,” in a footnote on p. 47, cites reichenbach’s 1928 philosophy of space and time (reichenbach, 1956) which suggests publication dates much later than the ones which friedman, reconsidering logical positivism, p. 7 is drawing from to explain reichenbach’s conception of the relativized a priori. 47 friedman, reconsidering logical positivism, p. 63. 48 cf. ibid., p. 77. 49 since he died in 1912, poincaré was not aware that einstein would, in fact, use a non-euclidean geometry of variable curvature. see friedman, reconsidering logical positivism, p. 79. 50 cf. the foregoing discussion with friedman, reconsidering logical positivism, pp. 64 – 65 and pp. 78 79. 51 cf. friedman, reconsidering logical positivism, p. 13. “the l-rules or logical rules represent the purely formal, non-empirical part of our scientific theory, whereas p-rules or physical rules represent its material or empirical content.” 76 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college to admit the 4-dimensional semi-riemannian manifold of non-constant curvature, while the p-rules now include applied geometry through optics and the other general laws of physics. what is important to note for carnap, says friedman, is that the l-rules (or analytic sentences) are distinguished from the p-rules at a given stage in the development of the scientific enterprise.52 that they are revisable in light of the development of the scientific enterprise is exemplified by applied or physical geometry in the move from classical mechanics to general relativity. however, carnap can still say this and can also hold on to the idea that in a physical language there is a distinction between analytic sentences and synthetic sentences. for it is the analytic sentences, axioms of coordination (in the case of reichenbach) and conventions (in the case of poincaré and schlick), that are constitutive of any endeavor to gain any objective scientific knowledge.53 in other words, only if we are armed with the axioms of coordination or l-rules can we begin to generate hypotheses and test them.54 thus, it is useful to have the distinction between the analytic and the synthetic even in science. on the other hand, i would argue that holists, like putnam, who oppose the distinction in science, have a hard time responding to the kantian question of “how is pure mathematics possible?” that is, they have a hard time explaining why mathematics and logic seem to be necessarily true, and therefore a priori. while they would say that mathematics and logic are framework principles which are to be identified with centrality and priority within our conceptual scheme, such that if revisions become necessary due to advances in science they are the last to be considered for revision,55 i would still argue that the holists would be hard pressed to explain away our belief that there is a marked difference between mathematics, on the one hand, and physical laws, on the other. the former cannot be otherwise, while the latter can. 4.5 applied geometry and the physical interpretation of a straight line lastly, we may critically evaluate putnam’s essay with respect to the physical interpretation of a straight line. hume, putnam says, would rather deny that light rays travel in straight lines than conclude that euclid’s postulate 5 is false.56 in other words, optical theory was synthetic for hume and (pure) euclidean geometry was analytic. in a footnote to a remark on reichenbach, putnam points out that reichenbach actually claimed that there were other possible alternative coordinative definitions of ‘straight line’.57 i take this to imply that for reichenbach, the optical 52 friedman, reconsidering logical positivism, p. 13. 53 ibid. 54 cf. rudolf, carnap, foundations of mathematics and logic (international encyclopedia of unified science ; vol. 1, no. 3) (chicago: the university of chicago press, 1939) p. 1 where he says, “in these theoretical activities, deduction plays an important part; this includes calculation, which is a special form of deduction applied to numerical expressions.” 55 putnam, “analytic and synthetic”, p. 40. 56 ibid., pp. 46 47. 57 putnam, “analytic and synthetic”, p. 47. 77issue iv f spring 2017 is geometry analytic theory was analytic (in the sense of stipulated true by convention) while the principles of geometry in general relativity were synthetic.58 putnam says that both hume and reichenbach are wrong: the principle that light travels in straight lines is a law of optics, nothing more or less serious than that. we test the conjunction of geometry and optics indeed, and if we get into trouble, then we can alter either the geometry or the optics, depending on the nature of the trouble.59 it is possible that reichenbach was correct in putnam’s footnoted discussion.60 for in a very enlightening discussion on the empiricism with respect to geometry of ernst mach, torretti points out that there are alternative physical interpretations of the straight line. in fact, interpreting straight line as the path of a light ray may not be the best approximation of a straight line. in this discussion from mach on how planes are constructed in practice: physically a plane is constructed by rubbing three bodies together until three surfaces a, b, c, are obtained, each of which exactly fits the others – a result which can be accomplished […] with neither convex nor concave surfaces, but with plane surfaces only.61 torretti observes, “if you construct two adjacent planes by this method, their common edge will provide a better approximation of the straight line than any taut string or light ray.”62 5. conclusion what this observation by torretti on the passage from mach suggests to me is that we have a choice of what physical interpretation to give our pure geometrical concepts. therefore, reichenbach could have been right in saying that the optical theory is analytic, hence a priori relative to pre-general relativity physics. recall that, in presenting carnap’s view, i said that friedman argues that, for carnap, the choice of l-rules and the interpretation that made them true is a matter of convention.63 now when we stipulate the interpretation of a straight line as the path of a ray of light, the stipulation is a matter of convention, since there are alternatives that are equally good physical interpretations. now, given that in the discussion of kinetic energy, putnam seems to grant that conventions are valid only if there are alternatives;64 and, given that there are alternative interpretations of a straight line, it follows that statements in the optical theory that interpret geometrical concepts are valid conventions, and are 58 ibid., p. 49. 59 ibid., p. 49f 60 ibid., p. 47. 61 torretti, philosophy of geometry from riemann to poincaré , p. 283 62 ibid. 63 friedman, reconsidering logical positivism, p. 13. 64 putnam, “analytic and synthetic”, pp. 45 he says, “[‘e=1/2 mv^2’] would be true by stipulation, yes, but only in a context which is defined by the fact that the only alternative principle is ‘e = mv’” 78 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college hence analytic. so, using the idea of the relativized a priori from friedman, i want to suggest that reichenbach could have been right in saying that the optical theory, which is a kind of applied geometry, was analytic (in the sense of stipulated as true by convention), and hence a priori, relative to pre-general relativity science. but optical theory (applied geometry) is now synthetic, and hence not a priori, relative to general relativity physics, and we can say this, however, without having to deny the view that pure euclidean geometry is analytic in carnap’s sense. f bibliography ayer, a.j. language, truth and logic. new york: dover publications, 1952. einstein, albert. sidelights on relativity. new york: dover, 1983. friedman, m. reconsidering logical positivism. cambridge, uk; new york, ny: cambridge university press, 1999. putnam, h. mind, language, and reality. putnam, hilary. philosophical papers; v. 2. y. cambridge [eng.]; new york: cambridge university press, 1975. torretti, r. philosophy of geometry from riemann to poincaré (episteme; v. 7). dordrecht-holland; boston: d. reidel pub, 1978. 70 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college δι ά νο ια kant's racial and moral theories the importance of a teleological perspective lauren toensing introduction it is often observed that the works of immanuel kant contain many propagations of racist and prejudiced beliefs, which seem to have been sincerely held by kant himself. !ere is currently a large and growing body of scholarly work engaging with this fact: some authors have demonstrated his role in the development of scienti"c race theory in the 18th and 19th centuries; others are investigating the connections between these racist beliefs and other aspects of kant’s thought; and still others are investigating what a serious engagement with kant’s apparently racist positions might reveal about the rest of his work. as an example of the latter, read john harfouch’s recent book, another mind-body problem. at its core, this essay is also attempting to understand kant’s prejudiced beliefs in the context of his whole system of thought, both as it is situated in history and in its contemporary philosophical applications. in particular, one short excerpt from kant’s 1795 essay “towards a perpetual peace” has been at the center of a debate about how kant’s racism interacts with his political and moral theories. !is quotation, given in the “!ird de"nitive article”, reads: if one compares with [the right of hospitality] the inhospitable behavior of the civilized states in our part of the world, especially the commercial ones, the injustice that the latter show when visiting foreign lands and peoples (which to them is one and the same as conquering those lands and peoples) takes on terrifying proportions… they brought in foreign troops under the pretext of merely intending to establish trading posts… they introduced 71issue x ◆ spring 2023 kant's racial and moral theories the oppression of the native inhabitants, the incitement of the di#erent states involved to expansive wars, famine, unrest, faithlessness, and the whole litany of evils that weigh upon the human species.1 a piece that has been highly controversial in this debate is a 2014 essay published by pauline kleingeld, in which she argues that kant “radically changed his mind” on race.2 she bases most of her argument on an interpretation of “perpetual peace”, including the above quotation, that has kant declaring people of color to be legitimate citizens of independent nations that demand the same respect as “civilized” or european nations. !is argument failed to convince many kant scholars of what would have been a late-life change of heart. in response, many have tried to "nd other explanations for the apparent contradiction that kleingeld points out in “perpetual peace.” one notable objection to kleingeld’s piece is lucy allais’s “kant’s racism,” which argues that kleingeld overemphasizes the notability of kant’s critique of colonialism. allais maintains instead that kant was, in the end, consistently racist and that the contradictions in his universalist moral and political theories can be attributed to “cognitive de"ciencies” common to racists interested in creating a manufactured congruence between their racist and moral beliefs.3 despite reaching opposite conclusions, both of these essays seem to view kant’s racism as a basically psychological phenomenon that preexists and is separable from the development of his larger philosophical system. however, their insistence that racist attitudes necessarily generate contradictions ignores the possibility that kant’s racial thought might be, in fact, entirely valid—even if also personally comfortable— within his system of thought. i think it is clear that the anthropology is not a peripheral text, as these arguments imply, and that the arguments and observations kant puts forth in his non-critical works should not be dismissed as less important than or tangential to his a priori works. in this essay, i argue that kleingeld and allais’s arguments are unsatisfactory because they fail to adequately prioritize the teleology ubiquitous in kant’s thinking when comparing his ethical and empirical work relating to race. ultimately, i demonstrate that, while there may be apparent contradictions in kant’s moral system regarding human di#erence, these contradictions are more easily accommodated for when viewed through the lens of his teleology, which unites his entire philosophy. 1 immanuel kant, “toward perpetual peace: a philosophical sketch,” essay, in toward perpetual peace and other writings on politics, peace, and history, edited by pauline kleingeld, translated by jeremy waldron, michael w. doyle, allen w. wood, and david l. colclasure, 67–109, new haven: yale university press, 2006, 82. 2 pauline kleingeld, “kant’s second !oughts on colonialism,” essay, in kant and colonialism: historical and critical perspectives, edited by katrin flikschuh and lea ypi, 43–67, oxford: oxford university press, 2014, 573. 3 lucy allais, “kant’s racism,” philosophical papers 45, no. 1-2 (2016): 1–36, https://doi.org/10.1080/05568641.2 016.1199170, 30. 72 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college "idea for a universal history with a cosmopolitan aim" and kant's teleology some of kant’s most explicitly teleological thinking can be found in his philosophy of history. in his essay “idea for a universal history with a cosmopolitan aim”, kant’s view of history and his moral theory are engaged in a dialogue, and this complicated dialogue produces an interpretative di$culty for readers seeking to reconcile it with the rest of his work. in this section, i will discuss the relationship between reason, ethics, and teleological history, and demonstrate (a) the primacy of the history to kant’s work and (b) the importance of viewing kant’s moral theory through that teleological lens. i begin by discussing the role of teleology in “idea for a universal history”, and demonstrating that kant’s belief in a purposed humanity underlies each of his major claims about the progression of history. !en, i investigate how this teleological sense of progress interacts with kant’s de"nitions of rational human nature and perfection. !ese investigations lead to the conclusion that, for kant, a state of human moral perfection is not yet realized, and can only be realized through cultural progress. such a state of humanity, it will be observed, is necessarily hierarchical. !is hierarchical structure, it will be argued, o#ers an internal buttress and place for kant’s racism. !e opening line to “universal history” reads: “whatever concept of the freedom of the will one may develop in the context of metaphysics, the appearances of the will, human actions, are determined, like every other natural event, in accordance with universal natural laws”.4 although “individual human beings and even whole nations” act according to their own free wills, the set of possibilities upon which they exercise their will is not determined by them. observable human actions are no more than appearances of individual human wills, the freedom of which is realized only within certain bounds—namely, those set by the will of nature.5 !us, each free human action is merely participating in some larger history bounded by nature’s will, and all human actions over time direct themselves toward “the ultimate destiny of the human race”.6 with this, kant immediately provides a limit through which human behavior—and its potential moral value—can and should be understood, which is the destiny coded into his predispositions. another aspect of kant’s teleology exempli"ed in “universal history” is its relationship to the principle of su$cient reason, which informs many of kant’s most basic philosophical claims. !e "rst proposition is as follows: all natural predispositions of a creature are determined sometime to develop themselves completely and purposively. with all animals, external as well 4 wood and kant, “universal history”, 108. 5 nature’s will is functionally the same for kant as the will of god, and thus can also be understood as perfectly good. 6 kant, lectures on ethics, 252. 73issue x ◆ spring 2023 kant's racial and moral theories as internal or analytical observation con"rms this. an organ that is not to be used, an arrangement that does not attain to its end, is a contradiction in the teleological doctrine of nature. for if we depart from that principle, then we no longer have a lawful nature but a purposelessly playing nature; and desolate chance takes the place of the guideline of reason.7 !e principle of su$cient reason asserts that every true phenomenon must have a su$cient reason or cause to justify its truth.8 !is proposition implies that all observable biological phenomena must contribute to or result from some greater intentional goal of nature, or else they are absurd. it can be seen, then, that in a world according to reason, a thing cannot exist without a telos, or some "nal purpose. history, of course, is not exempt from this. although the actual purpose of human history seems impossible to discover, kant is con"dent that some guideline running through history should exist, and that philosophers should search for it.9,10 most importantly, kant believes that the best way to "nd this path is through the analysis of human predispositions, and their pointing toward some ultimate destiny of humanity. !at is to say, kant believes that insofar as nature and telos intimately inform one another, adequate analysis of the predispositions given to us by our nature will elucidate our telos. one of these predispositions, which receives the most mention in “universal history”, is the capacity for reason. for kant, reason is the foundation of all moral laws, and the human capacity for reason is what allows us to function as moral agents.11 kant de"nes human beings as simultaneously causal and sensible creatures, meaning that, though they possess the ability to act autonomously—according to their free will and reason—they are also always bound by the laws of nature.12 !is duality of nature is what drives the tension between human actions as they tend to be versus how they ought to be. while human beings cannot behave as purely rational beings, they also “do not behave merely instinctively”;13 thus, it is possible for an individual to act according to pure reason, even if it would be unreasonable to expect them to do so at all times and for all actions. !is concept helps clarify how kant views the development of reason in the human being: it is not that reason itself increases across 7 wood and kant, “universal history”, 109. 8 !is is the leibnizian formulation of the principle, which was put forth in monadology. 9 wood and kant, “universal history,” 118. 10 importantly, kant does end this paper with a deference to historians and empirical evidence, indicating that he considers his propositions to be “up for debate”, in some sense. however, i think it is also reasonable to assume that this sort of evidence would have to be pretty massive for him to accept its criticism, especially because so many of the fundamental implications of these propositions are based on knowledge that kant uses as a basis for other a priori thought. i would think, perhaps, that the argument put forward in proposition 4 about the antagonism willed by nature in human beings is one that is “more” up-for-debate than that presented in proposition 1, which is more of an analytic statement based on kant’s undisputed belief in biological predispositions. !us, i interpret this statement to mean that kant is less sure of the application of nature’s will and its speci"c processes than the idea that nature has a will, and that it exercises that will on human society. 11 kant, groundwork of the metaphysics of morals. 12 kant, groundwork of the metaphysics of morals. 13 wood and kant, “universal history,” 108. 74 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college generations, or that its capacity necessarily di#ers between individuals, but that the laws of nature simply hold people back from exercising their capacity for reason in its fullest and most pure form. !e fourth proposition continues this line of thought in its analysis of how human beings actually exercise their capacity for reason. kant admits that the use of reason is not instinctual for human beings, and that it needs “attempts, practice, and instruction” in order to progress from stage to stage, and from a mere predisposition embedded in human nature to a fully realized capacity.14 furthermore, kant argues that full realization of this capacity in the individual is impossible; perfect reason will only be exercised in a perfect human society, which still contains imperfect human wills and inclinations, only now with a structure of knowledge and instruction that can help individuals learn how to best exercise their reason.15,16 even more so, an individual’s ability to act morally is inseparable from their cultural context and its own moral-rational development. since reason is the tool for moral action, they cannot develop into a perfect moral agent, and should not be expected to do so. due to this, it is important to consider the sociopolitical state of the world when looking at ethics from a pragmatic perspective: although the moral actions of individuals shouldn’t be expected to always be"t the present state of development, it seems there is good reason, from kant’s perspective, to think that prescriptive ethical suggestions should take this into account to be most e#ective.17 kant’s work regarding humanity does not admit the possibility of things being as they are simply because they are, demonstrated by his unquestioned acceptance of both a teleological perspective and the principle of su$cient reason. !e principle of su$cient reason establishes that human di#erence cannot be arbitrary, and the existence of a highest state of humanity, which mirrors the highest state of man as an individual, establishes that these di#erences exist on a spectrum of moral value. in propositions 5, 6 and 7, kant describes the concept that the only path towards moralization of the species is the development of a “civil society”, which follows certain internal and external political rules that are best suited towards the development of man’s free will and his capacity for reason.18 one major consequence of this idea, that a complete development of reason can occur only on a societal scale, is that reason is directly tied to culture. just as the individual can fail in instances of reason, and is even expected to, so can a society. 14 wood and kant, “universal history,” 109. 15 wood and kant, “universal history.” 16 kant, lectures on ethics. 17 i base this interpretation in part o# kant’s lectures on ethics, in which he asserts that there is some value to pragmatic judgements and that actions according to pragmatism can be good (even if they are not morally pure), and also on kant’s argument for the role of warfare and “disagreeability” in “universal history”: although he would presumably consider many aspects of warfare to be morally wrong, the development of culture cannot happen without it, which gives it an overall teleological goodness. 18 wood and kant, “universal history,” 112. 75issue x ◆ spring 2023 kant's racial and moral theories here, the link between teleology and anthropology becomes vital to understanding the meaning of kant’s history: culture has the distinct power to lock its people into certain states of existence if they do not appropriately exercise their capacities. !is happens through an undescribed metaphysical process that entirely stops the development of speci"c capacities, or “seeds”.19 furthermore, the development of this capacity can be completely stopped: when this happens regarding reason, a manifestation of human culture is completely locked out of participation in humanity’s "nal destiny.20 a society that stops men from using reason stops men from being men. so, for kant, it is of vital importance that human beings live in a culture that appropriately develops and instructs them toward the moral ideal, even if it does not instruct them perfectly, in order to move the whole of humanity forward. !e seed must not be locked away. inherent in a call for forward movement is the claim that it is better to be closer to an ideal than farther from it. by establishing the development of reason as the one good path for humanity, kant demonstrates that a hierarchy is fundamental to his vision of human development. an object simply must evolve toward something, since that something is already determined by another thing outside of the object itself. furthermore, that something contains a moral worth, also determined externally. !us, there have to be developments of human predispositions— which are now inextricably linked to manifestations of human culture— that are simply closer to the goal than others. !is is the perfect breeding ground for hierarchical prejudices to %ourish, exactly how we see in kant’s thought.21 fundamentally, kant’s form of racism— although searching for some biological justi"cation— is a cultural racism, and he ultimately sees race as a physical manifestation of a people’s culturally conditioned capacities. it is not necessary that this hierarchy be expressed as racism and sexism, the way kant does; nevertheless, such an expression makes sense in the context of the predominant beliefs in kant’s time. he was racist before he conceived of this teleological world, and he made no e#ort to escape this racism at any point; rather, he simply developed a system that worked in accordance with the beliefs he already held. !is can also be seen in kant’s ethical system in the context of what exactly he de"nes as moral goodness. it is not necessarily the case that a teleological perspective will lead to the conclusion of a reason-based moral goodness, like kant’s, but it again makes sense in the context of kant’s other beliefs and those who in%uenced him that it would develop in this way. overall, although none of these concepts rely on each other, 19 wood and kant, “universal history.” 20 immanuel kant, “on the di#erent races of human beings,” essay, in anthropology, history, and education, translated by zöller günter and robert b. louden, 82–97, cambridge, uk: cambridge university press, 2007, 86-87. 21 !is is also evidenced in his proposition that all men must have a master, even though that master is a man who also needs a master. !is is related to his political beliefs, and is also seen in the relationship between government and citizen that he puts forward in “what is enlightenment?”. 76 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college it is better supported in the text to understand kant’s racism and kant’s ethics as developed through a teleological lens, rather than through some other prevenient and incompatible bias, because the teleology can be found to entail in itself the basic assumptions that kant’s work operates upon, whether those be religious inclinations, prejudices, or even value judgements. it is not that any of these beliefs precede each other in time, but rather that kant’s idea that a purpose to humanity not only goes unquestioned but is necessary to explain why these other previous beliefs are correct, that proves the higher importance of teleology to kant’s system than his concepts that are explained through it.22 the importance of teleology to the realationship between ethics and anthropology !e given assertion that kant’s system of thought is a teleological one is hardly controversial—after all, he makes frequent explicit references to teleology and purpose across many of his critical and non-critical works. however, i argue that the importance of these teleological views should take precedence as the underlying ideology to kant’s system of thought. i have established the importance of these teleological principles to kant’s moral theory and its relationship to his theory of history; in this section, i explain how these principles also underlie the relationships between the di#erent parts within kant’s ethical system. in kant’s ethics, teleological principles determine not only the methodology by which ethical thought should occur, but also serves as the actual source of moral value. a central characteristic of kant’s ethics is its division into two distinct parts. in the groundwork, kant de"nes ethics as a study of freedom and the laws “to which [freedom] is subject”; from this, ethics is divided into an empirical part, called anthropology, and a rational part, called moral theory.2324 more speci"cally, anthropology is de"ned as a “science of the subjective laws of the free will”, and moral theory as a science of the objective.25 for kant, moral theory and anthropology must also be preceded by a pure metaphysics derived from a priori principles— speci"cally, the pure principles of a good will— in order to contain any real epistemological value.26 !is metaphysics of morals is determined by the nature of human beings as being both rational and causal beings, and thus kant posits that it would be equally valid for any other non-human being that also has rational cognition.27 because 22 !e necessity in this claim comes from kant’s adherence to the principle of su$cient reason. 23 kant, groundwork of the metaphysics of morals, 3. 24 for the purposes of this paper, i will only use these particular terms to describe this division, in order to accommodate for translation inconsistencies across kant’s works. 25 kant et. al., lectures on ethics, 3. 26 kant, groundwork of the metaphysics of morals. 27 for kant, a rational creature possesses reason and acts accordingly, not just to instinct; a causal creature recognizes themselves as being actors in the world. 77issue x ◆ spring 2023 kant's racial and moral theories these qualities are pure and non-empirical, a moral theory built upon them can be considered a priori and universal. using this a priori moral theory, philosophers should then be able to derive prescriptive, universal moral laws for all rational creatures including human beings. !e basis on which kant’s metaphysics of morals is built is the concept of the free will and its predicates, which all rational-causal beings possess. kant understands free will in man to be inseparable from his nature as a rational being, who ascribes his judgment to his reason rather than to an “impulse”.28 so, in doing a metaphysics of morals, one must engage with the idea of reason in its purest form; this is what kant does in the groundwork, as well as in the later metaphysics of morals. however, as was shown in the previous section, human behavior only rarely seems to be guided by pure reason. !e possession of the faculty of reason by human beings is not subject to improvement, but the ability to exercise it appropriately is. if one took human society as existing in some kind of “state” of reason, the highest of which would have all individuals ruled purely by their reason and acting only according to duty, then it would be clear that humanity does not currently exist in this state. furthermore, the world of behavior that kant describes through his analysis of pure reason must be understood as an ideal, and not easily accessible to human beings who must also contend with the sensible half of their nature. in kant’s philosophy of a universal history, it is clearly established that human nature will hold back individual agents from moral perfection. in universal history, he writes: in the human being … those predispositions whose goal is the use of his reason were to develop completely only in the species, but not in the individual. reason in a creature is a faculty of extending the rules and aims of the use of all its powers far beyond natural instinct, and it knows no boundaries to its projects.29 !is is due "rst to the fact that human beings are animals, and thus have inclinations, and second to the fact that they have a free will with which to follow whichever inclinations they desire.30 man’s capacity for reason makes him capable of acting according to duty, but at the same time it is unrealistic to expect him always to do so. despite the powers of reason beyond nature, man’s actual understanding and actions will always be limited by his sensible nature and inclinations. despite this, kant does maintain that it is possible for human beings as a society to learn to exercise their reason in such a way that they can achieve a state of 28 kant, groundwork of the metaphysics of morals, 58. 29 wood and kant, “universal history,” 109. 30 kant, groundwork of the metaphysics of morals. 78 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college moral perfection.31 although the groundwork focuses mostly on individual actions (maxims), the principles that a morally worthy maxim must ascribe to are fundamentally social: the categorical imperative demands consistency across individuals and situations, and thus it makes sense that kant would see moral actions as easier in a moral society than an immoral one. so, kant’s metaphysics of morals describes what moral value looks like for both individual actions and on a societal scale: all individuals must be seen as ends in themselves, and only societies and actions that adhere to this principle have real moral value. !is becomes possible when both are governed by pure reason. !e case of the individual is di#erent: he is a participant in society, and his actions can either be moral or immoral, but he cannot ever be ruled exclusively by his reason; he cannot himself have perfect moral worth, even if he tends to act according to duty. however, the more perfect his society is, the more easily he can exercise his reason without interference, and act according to consistent and duty-based maxims. finally, the process of human moralization culminates in kant’s emphasis on the necessity of moral instruction. kant’s discussion of moral instruction provides the clearest understanding of his view of a perfect moral state of humanity in his work and demonstrates the manner by which the capacity for reason and good moral action operates. for kant, virtue is not inherent, and also cannot be learned through examples; knowledge of virtue must be taught to individuals through the moral rule of duty, and only then will the individual have the necessary knowledge to live in best accordance with it.32 in this way, it is easy to see the progression of moral development in a society: the instructor has knowledge of moral truths, and passes on this knowledge to his students. in turn, his students have the time and knowledge to use their own reason to build upon and re"ne this knowledge, gradually increasing the moral capabilities of each generation.33 each individual will have to “actively struggle” against his instincts to “make himself worthy of humanity”, but the state of moral knowledge has no inclinations and will continue to develop in the memory of a society until it "nally reaches truth.34,35 at this point, the instructed members of said society are still wrestling against their human nature, but they have the real a priori knowledge that they need in order to act as perfectly and virtuously as their nature allows them. !is is the point at which it is crucial to classify kant’s racism as a cultural racism rather than phenotypic (i.e., inherently tied to skin color). !e development of the races is inseparable from cultural development, as demonstrated, and the fundamentally cultural nature of the realization of human beings’ predispositions 31 kant, “lectures on ethics.” 32 kant, groundwork of the metaphysics of morals. 33 wood and kant, “universal history.” 34 kant et. al., lectures on ethics, 252. 35 immanuel kant, “anthropology from a pragmatic point of view,” essay, in anthropology, history and education, translated by zöller gunter and robert b. louden, cambridge, uk: cambridge university press, 2007, 420. 79issue x ◆ spring 2023 kant's racial and moral theories marks culture as the basic determiner of racial di#erentiation. kant, as many of his enlightenment contemporaries, is particularly interested in reason, and thus the cultural development of reason exists at the forefront of his analysis of the development of the species as a whole. outlined in “universal history”, there are two paths of development that are available to mankind: "rst, there is one ordained by nature and evident in his predispositions, which strive towards the ideal application of reason; and there is another which happens if man fails to develop this reason in the species— if we “allow nature unfettered sway, the result is savagery.”36 kant holds that there are “savage” people existing in the world, and he de"nes them by their failure to exercise their capacity for reason.37 at the same time, he has faith in the enlightenment and the possibility of an ideal humanity, which he sees existing in the culture of europeans.38 if this group continues to exercise their reason, and in a su$ciently good way, then they will bring about a world in which it is possible for them to live according to pure moral laws. in his more pragmatic writings on what people or political groups ought to do in the real world, kant’s apparent deviations from the categorical imperative make sense if one assumes that, even though the enlightenment is the correct path towards perfection, it may not yet be possible to live in true accordance with the ideal principles of moral theory. ultimately, all of these factors come together to demonstrate the teleological basis of kant’s ethics. just as kant argues in the groundwork that the actions of some agent who acts morally according to some impulse or natural inclination contain less moral value than one who does so purely out of duty, the moral state of all of humanity holds value because it must be achieved through rational moral cognition. if human inclinations and desires were compulsively moral, like the divine will seems tobe, then they would be devoid of any real moral worth.39 it is not only that man is destined to achieve moral perfection, but that he “is destined to achieve his fullest perfection through his own freedom”, making that perfection in"nitely more worthy.40 so, man’s destiny cannot be untangled from the very qualities that allow him to pursue moral worth; functionally, the possibility of perfect moral worthiness is the same as the predisposition to achieve it. !is concept creates a slightly di#erent framework by which to understand the relationship between anthropology and moral theory for kant: while universal moral theory describes the ideal, that which ought to be, this ought is only meaningful because of the limits placed upon it by what is, i.e., anthropology. in describing the possibility of universal practical philosophy, kant writes that “[ethics and anthropology] are closely connected, and the former cannot subsist 36 kant et. al., lectures on ethics, 249. 37 kant, “observations on the feeling of the beautiful and sublime,” 60. 38 kant, “anthropology from a pragmatic point of view.” 39 kant et. al., lectures on ethics. 40 kant et. al., lectures on ethics, 252, emphasis mine. 80 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college without the latter”— no study of what man is capable of can be correctly done without an idea of what man is.41 while the universal moral imperatives of practical philosophy should not change, as they are contained in complete predispositions, the "ndings of anthropology can change as man develops and re"nes his nature towards something closer to the ideal. finding meaning in a struggle towards something against what is is a distinctly teleological way to de"ne meaning, and thus kant’s system of ethics is teleological—not necessarily because it is founded on explicitly teleological claims, but because its de"nition of value is one that constantly posits an eventual ideal against what is real. it is precisely this value that matters in the cultural hierarchy that kant’s racism is built upon: since culture is moralized, it holds relative value; since people are constrained by what their culture instructs, that relative value is passed on to them. the necessity of a teleology!first framework in interpretation of kant's moral writings from the above discussion, it should be evident that kant’s teleological approach to understanding human history and human nature underlies his assumptions in both his ethical thought and his work in anthropology. with this established, should also be clear that interpretation of kant’s moral and anthropological thought should always be done with resepct to the centrality of his teleological impulse. within this discussion, the particular debate surrounding pauline kleingeld’s claim in her essay “kant’s second !oughts on race” that kant abandoned— or at least lessened— his racist views somewhere in the 1780s or 1790s stands out as particularly interesting, and also particularly fruitless.42 kleingeld interprets kant’s anti-colonial statement in “perpetual peace” as an explicit rejection of racism. but shouldn’t a racist person, especially one who had previously supported colonial actions on other continents, have an interest in defending the national rights of those he deems inferior? leaning heavily on this interpretation of “perpetual peace”, kleingeld attempts— but ultimately fails— to produce a temporal account of kant’s personal prejudices in order to account for the presumed contradiction. in my reading, kleingeld fails to produce a satisfactory account of kant’s contradictions due to her interpretation of “perpetual peace” as a fundamentally moral document and her con"dence that kant’s racial and moral theories are ultimately incompatible. while she fully accepts that kant “did defend a racial hierarchy until at least the end of the 1780s,” she views his later assertion in “perpetual peace” that nations of color are deserving of equal “hospitality” as a complete reversal of that hierarchy.4344 41 kant et. al., lectures on ethics, 2. 42 pauline kleingeld, “kant’s second !oughts on colonialism,” essay, in kant and colonialism: historical and critical perspectives, edited by katrin flikschuh and lea ypi, 43–67, oxford: oxford university press, 2014. 43 kleingeld, “second !oughts,” 575. 44 kant, “perpetual peace,” 82. 81issue x ◆ spring 2023 kant's racial and moral theories fundamentally, this interpretation asserts that kant’s anthropology and other racist claims are essential, and incompatible with his universalist moral theory in that they restrict moral humanity from non-white peoples. !us, if nations of color can be recognized as sovereign nations, they must no longer be restricted from humanity, meaning kant must have changed his mind.45 however, in the very same paper that kleingeld heralds as evidence of kant’s changed views, he writes that europeans “view with great disdain the way in which savages cling to their lawless freedom.”46 !is indicates that the place of race theory in “perpetual peace” may be more complex than kleingeld’s interpretation, which can be understood through the teleological principles that i have discussed. firstly, “perpetual peace” is certainly a pragmatic document— its maxims work towards the end of having peace, which does exclude it from being a work of pure moral principles.47 it also can be seen as potential evidence of a step forward for humanity’s moral development; whereas the “universal history” suggests a purpose to war in the process of civilizing man, “perpetual peace” calls for a new era in history that prioritizes rational and enlightened interaction between peoples. it maintains the exact teleological principles that i described in section 1— one could even say that it functions as part of the pragmatic moral and political instruction that kant believes will lead to the full moral development of humanity. !is also explains the somewhat vague relationship the essay has with non-white societies: they are less developed than european society, even worthy of disdain, mirroring the exact cultural development of predispositions in “universal history”; simultaneously, non-white nations are still equally equatable to an end as more-civilized european nations, which maintains the moral rule.48 when the teleological principles are applied, the presence or absence of racial hierarchy in “perpetual peace” becomes irrelevant, which signi"cantly weakens kleingeld’s argument. on the other side of the debate, allais argues against kleingeld’s interpretation of the meaning of “perpetual peace” in regards to his racism, viewing her evidence as too weak and citing the fact that kant still published his deeply racist anthropology into the 1790s as proof that he could not have changed his opinion so much as to disagree with those claims. allais argues instead that kant’s inconsistencies simply are inconsistencies, and that this makes sense in the context of the psychological e#ects of racism. allais proposes a distinction between empirical racism, which would be based in mistaken thought, and disrespectful racism, which aims to humiliate or dehumanize the object of its disrespect, and is rooted in “normative-emotional attitudes” tied up with willing.49 she believes that kant himself demonstrates this 45 kleingeld, “second !oughts,” 55. 46 kant, “perpetual peace,” 79. 47 kant, “lectures on ethics.” 48 kant, “perpetual peace,” 68. 49 allais, “kant’s racism”, 22. 82 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college kantian disrespect in his racism. on this point, i must disagree— kant’s racism, although frequently disrespectful, doesn’t aim to disrespect or dehumanize; instead, it exists as the result of choosing to understand humanity through cultural comparison, especially one that aims to understand the teleological goal of human life. so, allais’s paper is also ultimately unsatisfying in its attempt at generating an understanding of how kant’s seemingly contradictory thoughts relate to each other. first, allais’s implication that kant’s pragmatic moral theory exists as a justi"cation for his racism ignores the actual distinctions within his ethics, as i described in section 2. it takes kant’s racism to be something born purely of prejudice, and not teleological in itself. !is leads to a reading that feels almost dismissive of a valid insight withing scienti"c racisms like kant’s, and the role that they play in a worldview that aims towards a teleological purpose. overall, allais’s paper is not a satisfying response to either kant’s own racism or kleingeld’s interpretation of it because it ignores the very conscious and intentional role that cultural comparison plays in kant’s construction of the teleological purpose of humanity itself. ultimately, kleingeld and allais’s papers both fail because they place too much emphasis on kant’s ethical theory without enough regard for his underlying teleological views. !is shared interpretive lens, despite the vastly di#erent conclusions that it can lead to, perpetuates this debate unnecessarily and leads scholarship in circles. by refocusing the question on the placement of “perpetual peace” in a progressive and purposed history, it is much easier to see how kant’s racial, moral, and political theories actually interact with each other towards his philosophical goals. !us, when writing about the relationship between parts of kant’s thought or the possibility for change across time, it is important to place all of his thought inside the teleological framework that he himself operated in. conclusion it is clear that kant’s "rst priority in his work is his teleology; it is evident in the end goal of humanity being something that individuals have a duty to work towards, as well as the more subtle ways that it grants value to morality in human beings and human culture. if this is not su$ciently recognized in interpretation of kant’s work, especially that which is empirical or pragmatic, then many of the threads between ideas are lost, and it is di$cult to "nd satisfying answers to his inconsistencies. furthermore, i think that is is actually reasonable to consider that kant was willing to have inconsistencies between his empirical anthropological work and his a priori moral theory— since we know that the pure principles of the latter cannot be based on the former, and the former is intended to be an observational empirical study of what is currently, not necessarily what must be, we can accept their contradictions as a manifestation of the complicated path towards realization of pure moral goodness in human society. after all, one individual— or even an entire culture— failing to embody these pure 83issue x ◆ spring 2023 kant's racial and moral theories principles does not have any e#ect on what makes them pure in the "rst place, or on whether they can or will be embodied in the future. it is not the job of a moral theorist in the kantian tradition— especially one outlining pragmatic rules, as kant aims to do in “perpetual peace” — to consider who is or is not worthy of receiving moral treatment, but how to construct rules that best sustain the moral rule while still being useful in the current reality of life.50 !e point, for kant, is to make the world better;51 at the same time, it is undeniable that his idea for how this is to be done is deeply embedded with racial and cultural hierarchy. while both kleingeld and allais make compelling interpretations on the controversial nature of kant’s “perpetual peace”, both ultimately fail to provide a satisfactory answer to the ambiguity of kant’s ethical stance on colonization. it is reasonable, especially from the more contemporary view of colonization as an inherently racialized form of violence, for their interpretation to be entirely entwined with kant’s writings on race; however, their focus on kant’s ethical and anthropological works leaves out a wealth of textual evidence that provides much needed context to “perpetual peace.” !e cultural hierarchy and unequivocal teleology demonstrated in kant’s “idea for a universal history” provide this context to the texts that kleingld and allais engage with, and particularly reveal a more nuanced interpretation of kant’s moral theory that can close the ideological gap that they see between kant’s racism and “perpetual peace.” !eir papers serve as examples of the importance of recognizing this teleology in kant’s system, taking the time to evaluate its in%uence on all of his system of thought, and reminding ourselves as scholars to be careful to be as accurate as possible when speculating what, precisely, kant is focused on when making value judgements. !e inconsistencies in kant’s thought between the “anthropology”, “perpetual peace”, and his ethical writings are much better understood in the context of his teleology, which demonstrates a much more consistent value basis across his entire body of work. 50 in this case, “worthiness” of moral treatment would be universally the end-status of an individual or nation, which is universal. even a person or culture that themselves do not exhibit sophisticated moral thought— or even, potentially, recognize themselves according to the same moral rule— should not be excluded, as that would violate the universalizability of the principle. 51 kant engages with this optimistic goal in a 1793 essay called “on the common saying: !is may be true in !eory, but it does not hold in practice,” writing: “i rely here on my innate duty to a#ect posterity such that it will become better (something the possibility of which must thus be assumed) and such that this duty will rightfully be passed down from one generation to another—i am a member of a series of generations, and within this series (as a human being in general) i do not have the required moral constitution to be as good as i ought, and therefore to be as good as i could be… however uncertain i am and may remain about whether improvement is to be hoped for the human race, this uncertainty cannot detract from my maxim and thus from the necessary supposition for practical purposes, that it is practicable.” 84 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college references allais, lucy. “kant’s racism.” philosophical papers 45, no. 1-2 (2016): 1–36. https:// doi.org/10.1080/05568641.2016.1199170. kant, immanuel. “anthropology from a pragmatic point of view.” essay. in anthropology, history, and education, translated by zöller günter and robert b. louden, 406–29. cambridge, uk: cambridge university press, 2007. kant, immanuel. groundwork of the metaphysics of morals: revised edition. translated by mary j. gregor and jens timmermann. cambridge: cambridge university press, 2012. kant, immanuel. !e metaphysics of morals: introduction, translation, and notes by mary gregor. translated by mary gregor. cambridge: cambridge university press, 1991. kant, immanuel. “on the common saying: !is may be true in !eory, but it does not hold in practice, part iii: against moses mendelssohn.” essay. in toward perpetual peace and other writings on politics, peace, and history. edited by pauline kleingeld, translated by jeremy waldron, michael w. doyle, allen w. wood, and david l. colclasure. 60-66. new haven: yale university press, 2006. kant, immanuel. “on the di#erent races of human beings.” essay. in anthropology, history,cand education, translated by zöller günter and robert b. louden, 82–97. cambridge, uk: cambridge university press, 2007. kant, immanuel. “toward perpetual peace: a philosophical sketch.” essay. in toward perpetual peace and other writings on politics, peace, and history, edited by pauline kleingeld, translated by jeremy waldron, michael w. doyle, allen w. wood, and david l. colclasure, 67–109. new haven: yale university press, 2006. kant, immanuel, and andrews reath. “introduction.” introduction. in critique of practical reason, vii-xxxi. translated by mary j. gregor. cambridge: cambridge univ. press, 1997. kant, immanuel, christoph mrongovius, !eodor friedrich brauer, and gottlieb kutzner. lectures on ethics. translated by louis in"eld. indianapolis, in: hackett publishing company, 1963. kleingeld, pauline. “kant’s second !oughts on colonialism.” essay. in kant and colonialism: historical and critical perspectives, edited by katrin flikschuh and lea ypi, 43–67. oxford: oxford university press, 2014. wood, allen w., and immanuel kant. “idea for a universal history with a cosmopolitan aim (1784).” chapter. in anthropology, history, and education, edited by robert b. louden and günter zöller, 107–20. !e cambridge edition of the works of immanuel kant. cambridge: cambridge university press, 2007. 43issue x ◆ spring 2023 a superior natural law theory in the works of johannes althusius δι ά νο ια a superior natural law theory in the works of johannes althusius alison vaughan johannes althusius’s third edition of his politica,1 published in 1614, presents a systematization of communal associations in his structuring of a political society. be!tting a thinker living in the complicated politics of the holy roman empire, his ideas—borrowing heavily from aristotle’s politics,2 and re"ecting his calvinist background—sought universal applicability both in catholic and protestant countries. behavioral guidelines and the tenets of associational happiness cement both public and private life in his polity, and althusius underpins these discussions with a theory of natural law. readers encounter two versions of such a theory within althusius’s body of work containing slight yet signi!cant variations. one is found in his politica and the other in his !eory of justice,3 published three years prior in 1607 as a juridical systemization seeking the same universal applicability.4 #ough !eory of justice seems to set forth a confusing mix of secular and religious sources of behavioral morals, this model presents a more philosophically sound system and compelling !t than the politica version within althusius’s entire schema of thought. johannes althusius (1557-1638) was a calvinist political theorist trained in both civil and ecclesiastical law, born in westphalia in modern northwestern germany. 1 politica methodical digesta atque exemplis sacris et profanis ilustra, translated as “politics methodologically set forth with sacred and profane examples,” commonly referred to as politica. #is paper refers to the only completed english translation available, frederick carney’s 1964 abridgement. 2 aristotle, politics: a new translation, trans. c.d.c. reeve (indianapolis: hackett publishing company, inc., 2017), 2-5. althusius adopts the aristotelian idea of community arising by necessity in nature as the only mechanism by which an individual can satisfy his needs. #e smallest division of such associations, namely, the conjugal relationship within the household, also forms the base of althusius’s schema. #e bestial nature of man without community also appears within this text, as does the idea that subjugation and hierarchy within political orders of men is not only necessary, but natural, as it mirrors similar structures in the animal and natural world. 3 dicaeologicae libri tres…, translated as “#ree volumes of a #eory of justice…, hereby referred to as #eory of justice. any information from this text referred to by this paper comes from the portion translated in on law and power. 4see on law and power’s “althusius in context: a biographical and historical introduction” p. xxii-xxvi. 44 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college #e widespread attention generated by the !rst edition of politica facilitated his transition to serve as syndic of emden in east friesland, a position he held until his death.5 his works fell out of academic interest until the 1800s with otto gierke’s rediscovery of the material and placing of the works as seminal in the development of modern western political thought,6 a position perhaps unjustly overshadowed by his contemporary, hugo grotius. however, a growing number of scholars has devoted considerable attention to althusius’s work in recent years,7 exploring its features of constitutionalism, jurisprudence, popular sovereignty,8 covenants, and integration of philosophy and political theory situated squarely in the transition from medieval to modern. emerging from relative obscurity, he has been deemed the “father of modern federalism”9 for politica's striking !t within the canon of modern thought.10,11 discovery of the impact and fundamentality of this author’s scholarship only grows with time, and there is much to be gained from an investigation into the theory of natural law he employs in his body of work. his particular conception is made all the more curious for its strange philosophical inconsistencies, pitfalls, and unique use of the decalogue. #e philosophical purpose, or even intentionality, of the core di$erences in althusius’s two models that this paper will discuss is not made explicitly clear by the author. given his profound connection to modern political ideas, scholars will undoubtedly also examine, reference, and synthesize his philosophical material with an eye towards the development of the contemporary natural law canon. recognizing that his principle works in fact contain two di$erent theories must be stressed in such endeavors. as such, there is no single “althusian natural law.” while both politica and !eory of justice rely heavily on the christian canon, the latter !nds a core legal basis in roman law. readers will !nd this more logically sound in its deriving personal duties than the technique of deriving double-sided duties employed in politica, but this also represents an internal inconsistency: the use of positive law as the foundation in a natural law system. #is paper will guide the reader through a comprehensive understanding of althusian terminology, the key philosophical components of his natural law theories, 5 for more information on his education and public service, see politica's “translator’s introduction” p. xi-xii. 6 politica, “translator’s introduction” ix. 7 on law and power, “series introduction” xvi. 8 in discussing modern natural law, sabine describes this element of althusius’s works as, comparative to contemporary texts, “#e clearest statement of popular sovereignty that had so far appeared” (p. 418). 9 brian duignan, “johannes althusius: german political #eorist,” in encyclopedia britannica, last modi!ed august 8, 2022, https://www.britannica.com/biography/johannes-althusius. 10 althusius’s political theory is described as the “!rst modern theory of federalism.” his vanguard conception is based on a subsidiary notion of the power to rule where sovereignty originates in the smallest societal associations and expands outwards and upwards. #e lowest layers can properly exist as independent units, but the larger are not valid in their own right. each tier has its own purpose, integrity, and jurisprudence. #is contrasts heavily with the conception of the absolute sovereignty of individual territories of the time and with the statism of later centuries. 11 malan, “johannes althusius’s grand federalism, the role of the ephors and post-statist constitutionalism,” pp. 2–8, 24. 45issue x ◆ spring 2023 a superior natural law theory in the works of johannes althusius and !nally, a discussion of the merits of each model weighed against one another. before moving beyond the context of his life to these following steps, it is notable to mention his thorough use of ramist logic in politica, a method in which extensive proper categorization and subdivision of the topics under consideration are said to illuminate both study and clari!cation.12 #is method permeates the entirety of politica with, as translator frederick carney states, “tiresome regularity throughout the whole volume.”13 #e reader ought to keep in mind the implicit framework of subdivision and tiered classi!cation in both of althusius’s natural law theories. politica is primarily a political work, and the majority of prior attention paid to this text has been to its components under this umbrella, but this paper approaches its philosophical elements. #erefore, a summary of a few of politica's key methodological components will equip the reader with su%cient context to approach the complexities of the natural law theory that appears alongside discussions of associational order. first, the base unit of political society in politica is not the individual of many contemporary accounts, but instead, the conjugal and kinship associations. examples of these include the nuclear family and clans made up of the paterfamilias of each family, respectively. #ese marital and familial groupings come together to constitute “collegia”14 and then larger associations such as the city, province, and commonwealth. regarding althusius’s use of the decalogue (ten commandments) of the christian tradition, following protestant convention, he designates the !rst table, or tablet, as commandments 1-415 and the second table as 5-10 (see appendix a, figure 1). we now begin examining the theory of natural law found in politica with a de!nition of its central philosophical terms. althusius’s distinction between what he calls common law (lex communis) and proper law (lex propria) illuminate his starting point. in contrast to the three categories most commonly used in this era—natural law, law of nations (jus gentium), and civil/positive law16—althusius boxes law into only these two above categories. according to common law, natural law behavioral guidelines arise at a basic level from knowledge, notitia, and from inclination, inclinatio.17 citing romans 1:19,18 althusius otherwise calls this law “conscience,” and says it is “naturally implanted by god in all men.”19 his citation of romans 2:1420 gives 12 politica, “translator’s introduction” xiii. 13 id., xv. 14 #e paterfamilias of a family enters society to form these, e.g. guilds, corporations, voluntary associations 15 politica, 141. 16 for more information on these three categories, see witte, “a demonstrative #eory of natural law.” 17 politica, 139. 18 all biblical citations in this paper use the new international version unless otherwise speci!ed. (19) “... since what may be known about god is plain to them, because god has made it plain to them. (20) for since the creation of the world god’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.” 19 politica, 139. 20 (14) “indeed, when gentiles, who do not have the law, do by nature things required by the law, they are a law for themselves, even though they do not have the law. (15) #ey show that the requirements of the law are written 46 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college further depth to the concept he has in mind. by conscience, we are compelled to do what we understand to be just and to avoid the unjust. he does, however, limit the reach of this law, which is said to encompass “nothing more than the general theory and practice of love, both for god and for one’s neighbor.”21 most importantly, when it becomes necessary to translate this natural law inclination into a legal system, common law is said to be unequally written on the hearts of everyone according to the design of god. althusius continues to cite biblical sources as evidence, and from this we understand he has in mind the blindness and clouded hearts of the wicked and the in"uence of man’s sinful nature as deterrents for recognizing and adhering to conscience’s demands. also, limits in individual capacity make the exercise of applying these general principles to particular situations di%cult for some. furthermore, even if this innate knowledge of just and unjust behavior is recognized, it is insu%cient in compelling some to actually act on it.22 here, we arrive at the need for althusius’s second category of law: proper law. proper law is common law adapted to particularities: the place, time, circumstances, and people of a given polity.23 #is law serves to teach and compel the “symbiotes”24 to follow the common law; the insu%cient compulsion and speci!city of common law is addressed here through the threat of punishment provided by a proper law system. to highlight the di$erence between the two, by common law, we understand that evil is to be punished, and by proper law, we determine what the punishment will be.25 to be su%ciently distinct from common law as to constitute something new, proper law adds or subtracts from it, though it cannot ever be completely contrary to common law. it gains its legitimacy from its base in the common law inclinations.26 both of these types of law share a purpose of “justice and piety, or sanctity, and the same equity and common good in human society.”27 #eir common starting point is “the right and certain reason upon which both laws rely.”28 proper law is changeable, common law is not.29 proper laws are “fences,” as althusius on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness, and their thoughts sometimes accusing them and at other times even defending them.” 21 politica, 140. 22 on law and power, 11. politica, 144. 23 politica, 144. 24 #is is althusius’s term for the individual members of an associated body. 25 for more information on the purpose and exercise of public punishment provided by law, see politica, ch. x-xvii “secular communication” p. 83. 26 id., 144. one of althusius’s tools for demonstrating this inclination-in-common is to cite in the original latin politica hundreds of sources of legal and historical texts with shared ideas and conclusions during each discussion, presumably to give credit to the idea that thinkers were all working with more or less the same conscience. in “a demonstrative #eory of natural law,” witte aptly terms this characteristic “intense eclecticism.” 27 id., 145. 28 ibid. #e curious reader might wonder as to whether these terms will play a signi!cant future role in politica. #ey will not, right/proper reason make few and far between appearances in the politica and are without de!nition or expansion, leading to the conclusion these function primarily as nods to the intellectual language of natural law discussions of the time more than as key components of his theory itself. indeed, politica deals with politics !rst and foremost. 29 id., 145. 47issue x ◆ spring 2023 a superior natural law theory in the works of johannes althusius describes them, guiding us along the “appointed” way when we cannot divine the path completely for ourselves.30 #erefore, the di$erences he saw between the legal systems of england, germany, and france, for example, were to him di$erences in manifestations of proper law rather than in the basic human common law. notably, roman law is listed as proper law, though when interpreted and applied equitably in line with common law, it can be said to exude natural law.31 to understand the decalogue’s central role in politica and subsequent use in althusius’s theories, we must establish why he deems it an appropriate source of natural law precepts. at a cursory glance, one might mistake it as the source of moral guidelines. however, althusius importantly clari!es that the decalogue is not natural law/common law in and of itself, but rather “agrees with and explains” the urges and inclinations experienced by every person.32 #e “general theory and practice of love of god and one’s neighbor,” the natural law already written on our hearts, is merely expressed as a more concrete set of guidelines through these commandments. #ough some deem this natural law purely theological, althusius insists upon the importance of its inclusion within politics.33 he concludes that piety and justice are necessary components of a well-ordered political society, and thus are essential to preserve when building a healthy life in common. in his eyes, the decalogue is an instrument to help foster these qualities since it communicates how people ought to live and behave, infusing a “guiding light” into politics.34 it only becomes theological when its commands are carried out with a heart toward pleasing god but can be secular and useful in its provisions for a just life.35 with knowledge of these foundational pieces, we now approach the intriguing feature of althusius’s body of works– the aforementioned natural law theory in politica and the con"icting one in !eory of justice. both deal with duties owed by each person to various recipients. in politica, which will be examined !rst, althusius provides a “"at” interpretation of the decalogue where duties to self and duties to others (subdivided into duties to one’s neighbor and duties to god) both arise from its ten precepts. #e perfection, encapsulation, and furthest extension of these duties is the golden rule, or treating others as one would like to be treated (see appendix a, figure 2). politica's introduction of duties to others appears in the discussion of duties that ought to be imparted to one’s neighbor. “#e precepts of the decalogue,” althusius states, “are both a%rmative and negative,”36 so from each can be derived speci!c actions and inactions. he begins by determining what duties we owe to our neighbor, and from 30 id., 139. 31 id., 148. witte, “a demonstrative #eory of natural law.” 32 politica., 144. 33 such a categorical justi!cation is all the more necessary given his adoption of the methods of ramist logic. 34 politica, 11. 35 id., 147. 36 id., 80. 48 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college there we can also know what ought not to be done to our neighbor. #ese things owed, which are “his so that he rightly possesses them,”37 are his life, the liberty and safety of his body, his dignity, reputation, good name, and honor, chastity of body, the right of family and citizenship,38 and external goods. althusius then explains how the second table of the decalogue prescribes duties relating to safeguarding these very features.39 again, since not all men can divine and act on inclinations to owe such duties to others, “through the law comes knowledge of things to be done and to be omitted.”40 here, althusius quotes from romans 3:20.41 #e second table thus teaches us of justice, of “the use of the body and of this life, and the rendering to each his due.”42 duties to others are broken down in politica into “special” and “general” duties.43 special duties come from the !fth commandment and deal with what is owed by inferiors to superiors, namely, respect and obedience. extrapolating from obedience to parental !gures to obedience to all authority !gures everywhere might seem too far a leap, but this aligns with althusius’s treatment of the conjugal association as part of the “seedbed of all private and public associational life.”44 parental authority serves as a foundational model for larger scale political authority. #e rest of the commandments house general duties owed by each symbiote to everyone. #is is the theory’s key feature. althusius breaks each commandment down into both duties owed to others and corresponding duties owed to oneself. for example, regarding the sixth commandment, he interprets its instructions as “defending and preserving from all injury the lives of one’s neighbor and oneself,” and for the seventh, “guarding by thought, word, and deed one’s own chastity and that of the fellow symbiote, without any lewdness or fornication.”45 when addressing this topic again in a later chapter, althusius declares that within the sixth commandment, protection of one’s own life comes !rst and consists of “the defense, conservation, and propagation of oneself.”46 in a political system, these duties serve to promote the utility and welfare of the associated body.47 37 id., 80. 38 althusius distinguishes between citizens and “foreigners, outsiders, aliens, and strangers whose duty it is to mind their own business.” id., 40. 39 nowhere else in politica does althusius argue that the speci!c duties owed to others come from ideas of objective possession of goods or qualities, so here, it can be interpreted he starts o$ going down this route most likely to highlight the decalogue’s role as a device that coincides with the natural law inclinations of man. 40 id., 82. 41 “#erefore no one will be declared righteous in god’s sight by the works of the law; rather, through the law we become conscious of our sin.” 42 politica, 75. 43 id., 52. 44 id., 31. 45 politica, 52. for full discussions of the positive and negative duties of each commandment of the second table, see ch. vii-viii “#e province” p. 52, ch. x-xvii “secular communication” p. 81, and ch. xxi-xxvii “political prudence in the administration of the commonwealth” p. 142-143. 46 politica, 142. 47 id., 75. 49issue x ◆ spring 2023 a superior natural law theory in the works of johannes althusius fostering piety and justice is a consistent theme in the body of politica with the former always tied to the !rst table of the decalogue and the latter to the second table.48 while duties to neighbors and the corresponding duties to self constitute justice, duties to god in commandments one through four are devices to promote piety and the glory of god.49 #ese break down into private internal worship, private external worship, and public worship.50 notably, the second table is said to yield to the !rst as a higher law.51 again, while some might deem the supposed virtue of these behaviors to be solely theological, althusius claims they are necessary for any natural law, since, “if symbiosis is deprived of these qualities, it should not be called so much a political and human society as a beastly congregation of vice-ridden men.”52 he even goes as far as to say that religion is the fountain of all symbiotic happiness, since true piety is linked to belief in eternal salvation.53 #e !nal step in this system of ought and ought-not behaviors is the golden rule. #ough less emphasis is given to this topic than to justice and piety, althusius describes it as the summation of the principles of justice. while the decalogue embodies common law inclinations, the golden rule must be of supernatural origin, for such a standard cannot be reasoned to or deduced from the natural world. instead, its existence and binding moral authority arises from divine revelation through scripture. for this reason, althusius places it in the third and !nal tier. to explain this concept, he cites matthew 22:39,54 7:12,55 shabbat 31a,56 and, interestingly, the digest.57 #e golden rule seems to be the ultimate culmination and perfection of justice, and to that e$ect althusius states, “above all, we vouchsafe and do to our neighbor what we wish to be done to ourselves.”58 when moving from politica, a theory of a political system, to !eory of justice, a comprehensive work on law and justice, one might expect a more in-depth discussion of this same natural law theory. instead, one !nds intriguing di$erences at the core 48 id., 12, 74. 49 id., 75 50 id., 52. for further discussion of a%rmative and negative commands of each commandment of the !rst table, see ch. xxi-xxvii “political prudence in the administration of the commonwealth” p. 141-142. 51 id., 141. 52 id., 147. 53 id., 161. 54 (37) “jesus replied: “‘love the lord your god with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ (38) #is is the !rst and greatest commandment. (39) and the second is like it: ‘love your neighbor as yourself.’” 55 “so in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the law and the prophets.” 56 (6) “#at which is hateful to you do not do to another; that is the entire torah and the rest is interpretation.” 57“justice is a steady and enduring will to render unto everyone his right. (1) #e basic principles of right are: to live honorably, not to harm any other person, to render to each his own. (2) practical wisdom in matters of right is an awareness of god’s and men’s a$airs, knowledge of justice and injustice.” d 1.2. althusius’s inclusion of roman law on seemingly the same level of moral authority as general scriptural verses appears puzzling at !rst, but the reader might refer back to his strategy of citing ideas in common in legal systems and also the idea that proper law, when interpreted in line with common law, can be treated as a legitimate extension as such. #is is not such a problematic use of roman law as that in !eory of justice since here, this citation is supplementary to biblical texts and does not function as the sole source of the most primal common law urges. 58 politica, 81. althusius sums his entire system on id., 74 stating, “we should live temperately towards ourselves, justly towards others, and piously towards god.” 50 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college level meriting further exploration. althusius breaks down natural law obligations in book 1, chapter 13 “on common law,” which can be understood as a system of three tiers (see appendix a, figure 3). first, there exists duties to oneself in the form of three impulses: self-defense, self-preservation, and self-promulgation. #is initial tier can be understood as the most basic, and althusius derives authority for his claims about the personal duty of self-defense from roman law, citing the institutes,59 codex,60 and digest.61 for legitimizing self-preservation, althusius cites biblical sources. #ough, when he pulls from the christian canon in ephesians and colossians, the verses he cites either have little to do with self-preservation62 or merely speak of men nourishing their bodies, so what exactly he is referring to there is unclear.63 while this implies, at the very least, the bene!ts of self-preservation, the only direct instructions for doing good to oneself come from citations of the apocryphal book of sirach.64 with respect to self-propagation, althusius again refers to the institutes, referencing a chapter on the law of nature being those urges that are shared between animals and humans, such as the desire to procreate.65 #ese laws of nature are said here to be those “… which all nations observe alike, being established by a divine providence, and remain ever !xed and immutable.”66 #e basis of althusius’s !eory of justice natural law system, or that which constitutes this !rst tier, is partly these animalistic traits, the inclinations common to everyone by virtue of being a human. #is mix of biblical and roman behavioral guidelines also presents a less rationalist origin than the notio and inclinatio of common law. #e theory then expands outward to the second tier of duties to others, which breaks into duties to god and duties to our neighbor. #e knowledge and worship of god (piety) is said to come from the !rst table of the decalogue while protecting one’s 59 “to kill wrongfully is to kill without any right; consequently, a person who kills a robber is not liable to this action, that is, if he could not otherwise avoid the danger with which he was threatened.” (3) “nor is a person made liable by this law, who has killed by accident, provided there is not fault on his part, for this law punishes fault as well as wilful wrongdoing” for more examples, see the rest of title iii de lege aquilia. i 4.3.2-3. 60 althusius refers to part of a collection of imperial decrees expanding basic self defense to the integrity not just of one’s body, but also of one’s property, speci!cally through recompense for private property damages. c 3.35. 61 “you see, it emerges from this law (jus gentium) that whatever a person does for his bodily security he can be held to have done rightfully; and since nature has established among us a relationship of sorts, it follows that it is a grave wrong for one human being to encompass the life of another.” d 1.2. 62 see colossians ch. 2. 63 ephesians 5:29“after all, no one ever hated their own body, but they feed and care for their body, just as christ does the church—” 64 sirach 4:5-6 (douay-rheims 1899 american edition)“to whom will they be generous that are stingy with themselves and do not enjoy what is their own? (6) no one is meaner than the person who is mean to himself, this is how his wickedness repays him.” #is section also claims the associated citations will direct the reader to sources pertaining to protection of one’s property, but the only subjects in them remotely approaching such protection are warnings against coveting and adultery. (see sirach 23:21, sirach 30:26) one wonders why roman law, if deferred to regarding other duties to self, is not also cited here given its abundance of instruction as regards property law. 65 “#e law of nature is that law which nature teaches to all animals. for this law does not belong exclusively to the human race, but belongs to all animals, whether of the air, the earth, or the sea. hence comes that yoking together of male and female, which we term matrimony; hence the procreation and bringing up of children. we see, indeed, that all the other animals besides man are considered as having knowledge of this law.” i 1.2. 66 ibid. 51issue x ◆ spring 2023 a superior natural law theory in the works of johannes althusius neighbor (justice) comes from the second just as in politica.67 finally, duties to others are said to ultimately teach us “whatever you wish to be done to you, you should also do to another,” or the golden rule. #ese outward tiers re"ect an identical structure to that of politica. it is in the !rst tier that the di$erences emerge. now able to weigh these two theories against one another, it becomes clear that the !eory of justice model, though not without certain muddied elements, presents the more philosophically grounded theory. #is is a result of the weakness of the argument of duties to self in politica. for example, as regards the duty of “defense, protection, and conservation of one’s own life and that of the neighbor” within the sixth commandment, althusius argues protection of one’s own life is primary,68 but fails to provide solid ground for this claim. he even changes course in ch. i, discussing the bene!ts of prioritizing others over oneself with references to 1 corinthians 10:2469 and philippians 2:4.70 in searching for some semblance of an explicitly stated right to self-defense in politica like that provided by !eory of justice, althusius determines, “no one can renounce the right of defense against violence and injury.”71 he also names “defense of liberty and of one’s rights, and the repulsion of a launched attack” as a possible cause for a just war.72 however, in the same section he delineates “defense” as “either of your own nation or another,” so it is unclear whether this discussion is applicable to the personal level. indeed, the defense of life, honor, reputation, and goods is entrusted to the supreme magistrate.73 following althusius’s schema,74 this implies that these rights of defense, in order to have been conceded to the magistrate, did at one time belong to the conceding unit, but as we have discussed above, the smallest unit of this system is the family and the collegia, not the individual. #ese statements o$er no illustration of any individual right to protection, leaving the politica theory without legs. #e only other mention of self-defense in politica appears in chapter xxxviii “tyranny and its remedies,” but readers will see this also is not an indication of this personal right in althusius’s schema. he begins by asserting that the proper course of 67 on law and power, 10. 68 politica, 142. 69 “no one should seek their own good, but the good of others.” 70 “... not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.” behavioral commands althusius provides from scriptural passages in the new testament would have likely been regarded by him as compulsory and legitimate given his calvinist background. however, readers ought to keep in mind that within his system, only the decalogue represents common law. #e rest of scripture can be understood as an expansion on these general principles. 71 politica, 125. 72 politica, 187. 73 #e administrator and steward of the rights of sovereignty in the association; the highest political !gure. id., 168, 178, 190. 74 power, authority, and sovereignty of leaders is theirs only by a concession on the part of the people, with whom the right to sovereignty ultimately and originally lies. in order for a leader to have possessed a certain right to an action, it must have at one time belonged to and been conceded by the people. id., 72-73. 52 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college action when faced with a “tyrant by practice”75 is to "ee since individuals do not have the “right of the sword,”76 e.g. david hiding from saul in the mountains.77 notably, he follows that when “manifest force” is applied by the tyrant to individual symbiotes, “then in the case of the need to defend their lives resistance is permitted to them.”78 however, this resistance is limited; these private people must await the commands of the ephors79 before acting. #ough natural law is said to be the giver of this right,80 althusius o$ers little grounding. in essence, self-defense is a highly quali!ed right, far from an automatic remedy, and included as more of an afterthought in a later chapter rather than as a core component of the natural law theory in politica.81 #ough both models argue the primacy of self-defense, it is only !eory of justice that o$ers a clear source of the right from roman law. another shortcoming of politica is its di%culty grounding any duty to oneself at all. in this work, althusius places corresponding duties to self alongside the duties a symbiote owes to others via each of the ten commandments. as e%cient as it is to pull all of these prescriptions from a single source, readers must nevertheless ask themselves, can duties to self be said to clearly follow from a list of prescribed treatment of others? perhaps it might be said that the fact these duties are owed by others to us implies we ourselves are worthy of the same treatment, and thus owe it to ourselves. however, the decalogue ultimately says absolutely nothing in and of itself regarding what we self-re"exively owe. #erefore, as althusius has elected to utilize the decalogue as the clari!cation of natural law and his only source of behavioral guidelines in politica, the choice of this particular device limits him and does not properly allow for the duties to self he prescribes to it. #ough raising the ever-present question of whether roman law is actually a legitimate source to back up claims of duties to self in !eory of justice, the model manages to o$er evidence for them. for a !nal complication, the order of the !rst tier of duties is a$orded no clear hierarchy in politica. #e !rst table (duties to god) is said to be primary to the second table (duties to others), but if duties to others are at the bottom, which is the utmost priority, self-defense or piety? if duties to self are slightly superior correlatives 75 tyranny performed by an accepted member of o%ce in the associated body in which one “neglected the just rule of administration, acts contrary to the fundamentals and essence of human association, and destroys civil and social life.” for a discussion of special and general tyranny, see id., 192-193. 76 lit., “usus et jus gladii.” althusius appears to use this term to refer to violent force exercised by public authority. 77 id., 196. 78 ibid. 79 public ministers of the associated body at the same level as the supreme magistrate, elected by the people, and designed to serve as a power check. 80 politica, 196. 81 george h. sabine, a history of political #eory, #ird edition. (new york: holt, rinehart and winston, inc., 1962), p. 382. additional evidence that althusius is not arguing for an individual right of self-defense and, instead, is arguing for the right to collective resistance through the ephors can be found by examining contemporary texts based on the same calvinist principles. in vindiciae contra tyrannos, published forty years prior to althusius’s politica by huguenots (french calvinists in the 1500-1600s), a right to resistance is given to inferior magistrates as a counteraction against royal power. notably, “its rights were the rights of corporate bodies and not of individuals.” 53issue x ◆ spring 2023 a superior natural law theory in the works of johannes althusius of duties to others in the second table, duties to god could be interpreted to be above them. #e careful reader again asks why. #is also marks a stark contrast to the !eory of justice model where duties to self exist in the !rst tier, followed by duties to others and to god, with no explicit priority given to one over the other. #is second model makes more sense given duties to others– to neighbors and to god– come from the same source, so are indeed equal in priority. in essence, in !eory of justice, we !nd a far more satisfying and cohesive breakdown of duties owed, beginning with the individual to himself and extending to others, both to god and to men, and !nally reaching fully outward with the golden rule. as another advantage of the !eory of justice model, this theory situates itself cohesively within althusius’s calvinist perspective. it begins with base urges and extends outward with each layer requiring more intervention on the part of the supernatural. for example, in tier 1, one does not need to be taught a duty of selfpropagation common even to animals. duties to self via a connection to the same urges experienced by animals lines up well as the most base form of what is innate to every person, or the notio and inclinatio. speci!c treatments of others and acts of worship to god are based on inclinations but are given more speci!city in tier 2. a !nal tier 3 standard of treating others as one might like to be treated is not found in the state of nature, and thus requires supernatural intervention and guidance. #is natural law system justi!es and upholds the necessity of althusius’s own religious beliefs. #is model also !ts well within the schema of other sections of politica with the family as the natural unit and the need for authority. in such discussions, althusius states that, since hierarchies of inferiors submitting to superiors exist in the animal world, subjugation is also natural in the political order. “common law,” he states, “indicates that in every association and type of symbiosis some persons are rulers (heads, overseers, prefects) or superiors, others are subjects or inferiors.”82 if the legitimacy of authority mirrors those models found in nature, the same can also be said of law. #ough more cogent in its tiers and evidence, !eory of justice is not without its own limitations as a natural law theory. #ere remains the problem of roman law, a proper law system, appearing at the center of a theory whose second and third tiers are common law and the perfection/supernatural extension of common law. during the high middle ages, roman law was seen by althusius and his contemporaries as a sound and excellent legal system,83 but an appeal to the roman canon is lacking in explicitly evidenced legitimacy within the entire schema of althusius’s thought. perhaps he would claim the roman law he cites for duties to self is su%ciently in alignment with common law to be considered natural law. even if this interpretation was indeed his intention, one questions its arbitrary nature and propensity for self82 politica, 20. 83 witte, “a demonstrative #eory of natural law.” 54 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college selection bias. especially with a system designed to be universally applicable like politica's, readers might consider that not every thinker mixing religion, philosophy, and politics has so agreed on the validity of a right to self-defense that its existence can be presumed a settled matter.84 worthy of mention is a problem pertaining to both theories– the practicality of the inclusion of the golden rule within a schema of natural law reasoning. along with the politica cited verses previously mentioned, in !eory of justice, we can understand this rule to be matthew 7:2-12,85 1 john 2:11,86 and romans 2:1387 among others.88 #is rule is included more as an afterthought in discussions of duties to others, but jurisprudentially, such a component being ascribed to a natural law behavioral system has signi!cant rami!cations for a legal system. are punishments to be meted out for people who do not love their neighbors as themselves? while vices such as sel!shness are not strictly forbidden in the decalogue, with the inclusion of the golden rule, this act and others like it fall into a prohibited category. since althusius is attempting in politica to build a system of associations that would be compatible across time and place in the fragmented medieval germany he occupied, no concrete "eshing-out is done to his proposed behavioral system, and the general is favored over particular application. #e reader is left wondering whether it would be possible, or in any sense practical, to include the golden rule as anything more than a lofty ideal. althusius’s cogent systematization of a polity theoretically applicable to all in politica is made more e$ective by the underpinned idea of natural law arising from inclinations possessed by every human being. #ough the two models of this theory in his works share the majority of their features, the !eory of justice use of roman law in justifying duties to self is far more coherent than attempting to derive both these and duties to others via only the decalogue in politica. #e commandments of this artifact itself limit how far althusius can take it, perhaps unsatisfactorily so that he simply had no choice but to rely on an overextension in politica. rising in attention and importance, althusius’s philosophical thought will likely be a$orded much upcoming analysis. #e existence of two distinct theories within his body of works and their philosophical merits and downfalls must be recognized, especially with an eye towards comparing his schema to his contemporaries and placing him within the development of the modern canon. 84 augustine, notably, denies such a right. 85 “for in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you… (12) so in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the law and the prophets.” 86 “but anyone who hates a brother or sister is in the darkness and walks around in the darkness…” 87 “for it is not those who hear the law who are righteous in god’s sight, but it is those who obey the law who will be declared righteous.” 88 for a comprehensive list, see on law and power p. 16, n 59. 55issue x ◆ spring 2023 a superior natural law theory in the works of johannes althusius appendix a ! figures figure 1. !e ten commandments, exodus ch. 20 (niv) table 1. 1. “you shall have no other gods before me.” 2. “you shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. you shall not bow down to worship them…” 3. “you shall not misuse the name of the lord your god.” 4. “remember the sabbath day by keeping it holy. six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath to the lord your god. on it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns.” table 2. 5. “honor your father and mother…” 6. “you shall not murder.” 7. “you shall not commit adultery.” 8. “you shall not steal.” 9. “you shall not give false testimony against your neighbor.” 10. “you shall not covet your neighbor’s house. you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his male or female servant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor. figure 2. !e politica model figure 3. !e !eory of justice model 56 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college references althusius, johannes. on law and power. translated by je$ery j. veenstra. grand rapids: acton institute, 2013. althusius, johannes. politica. edited and translated by frederick s. carney. indianapolis: liberty fund, 1995. “annotated justinian code.” george w. hopper law library. university of wyoming. accessed on december 23, 2023. https://www.uwyo.edu/lawlib/ blume-justinian/ajc-edition-2/books/book3/index.html. aristotle. politics: a new translation. translated by c.d.c. reeve. indianapolis: hackett publishing company, inc., 2017. bible gateway. harpercollins christian publishing. accessed on december 23, 2022. https://www.biblegateway.com/. duignan, brian. “johannes althusius: german political #eorist.” in encyclopedia britannica. last modi!ed august 8, 2022. https://www.britannica.com/ biography/johannes-althusius. #e digest of justinian: volume 1. translated and edited by alan watson. philadelphia, pennsylvania: university of pennsylvania press, 2009. malan, koos. “johannes althusius’s grand federalism, the role of the ephors and post-statist constitutionalism.” potchefstroom electronic law journal 20, no. 1 (2017): 1–34. accessed march 30, 2023. https://doi.org/10.17159/17273781/2017/v20i0a1350. sabine, george h. a history of political #eory, #ird edition. new york: holt, rinehart and winston, inc., 1962. #e institutes of justinian. translated by #omas collett sanders. westport, connecticut: greenwood press, 1970. “shabbat: talmud: #e william davidson edition.” sefaria. sefaria, 2021. https:// www.sefaria.org/shabbat?tab=contents. witte, john jr. “a demonstrative #eory of natural law: johannes althusius and the rise of calvinist jurisprudence.” ecclesiastical law journal 11, no. 3 (september, 2009): 248–256. accessed december 10, 2022. https://doi.org/10.1017/ s0956618x09990044. 44 δι αν οι α g.k. chesterton and the quest for heideggerian authenticity clare chiodini the public careers of g. k. chesterton, novelist and catholic convert, and martin heidegger, philosopher and lapsed catholic, overlapped for roughly twenty-five years from the beginning of the second decade of the 20th century.1 in this paper, i will seek to foster a dialogue between these two authors by analyzing one of each’s most famous works: heidegger’s being and time2 and chesterton’s the ball and the cross. after describing heidegger’s thought, we will show that chesterton, like his german counterpart, understood the difference between an authentic and a fallen existence (what heidegger calls ‘dasein’3 ), by demonstrating how this understanding is exhibited in his novel. however, despite their many similarities, the two works differ in a crucial way. highlighting this divergence, iwill conclude by arguing that heidegger’s explanation of guilt and resoluteness is incomplete without 1 chesterton was born in 1874, fifteen years before heidegger, and died in 1936, forty years before heidegger’s death. 2 in being and time, heidegger contends that philosophy has ceased to explore the question of being’s meaning, considering it to be a universal or self-evident concept that resists definition. heidegger therefore sets out to formulate a conception of being itself. however, the being he seeks to define is the being of particular entities, which may be designated as beings with a lower case ‘b’. in order to understand being in itself, heidegger decides it is first necessary to gain access to a particular entity, or being, as it is in its being. the entity he prioritizes towards this end is dasein. heidegger, martin, being and time (new york: harper & row, 1962), pp. 6-8. 3 in heideggerian language, dasein denotes the particular being whose being matters to it. dasein must be distinguished from other objects in the world because it “relates to its existence always as its own… it exists in the first-person as a ‘who’ not a ‘what’.” although ‘dasein,’ as a german term, is held as untranslatable, it may be roughly understood as a combination of the verb ‘to be’ and the adverb for ‘place’. therefore, dasein indicates ‘a being which is here’. for heidegger, “being-here is not reducible to merely occupying a space. to be-here is to experience a world opening up.” dahlstrom, daniel o., the heidegger dictionary (new york: bloomsbury publishing plc, 2013), p. 35. 45issue iv f spring 2017 g.k. chesterton and the quest for heideggerian authenticity something exemplified by the characters in chesterton’s novel, i.e., without a reason for choosing to choose. part i in section 60 of being and time, heidegger writes that ‘resoluteness’ is “the reticent self-projection upon one’s ownmost being-guilty, in which one is ready for anxiety.”4 this statement culminates many chapters worth of explanation, which i shall attempt to summarize and explore below. resoluteness is essentially the projection of one’s possibilities in light of one’s existential5 state of guilt. by ‘guilt,’ heidegger does not mean to suggest a moralistic, dooming sensation of having done wrong. while the philosopher does not deny a relationship between morality and guilt, he understands the latter as being a condition for the former: one can be morally good or evil because one is primordially being-guilty.6 this existential sense of being-guilty heidegger defines as “beingthe-basis of a nullity.”7 this meaning is two-pronged: in the first place, there is nothing dasein can point to as the basis of its existence – of its factical projection of potentiality-for-being. in the second place, however, dasein finds itself responsible, despite this lack of basis, for choosing one possibility over another. it is responsible for its freedom to project some possibilities while rejecting others. this freedom is not a cold fact, but rather is a burden to dasein. the authentic seizure of certain possibilities is a responsibility it must undertake for itself. the implications of this freedom bear heavily on dasein’s relation to its own being. as i shall explain below, dasein’s conscience identifies its guilt by recalling itself from its state of being lost in the ‘they’” (the crowd)8. 4 heidegger, being and time, p. 297. 5 existentials are ontological facts which describe the mode of dasein’s being; they are the, “characters that make it up existentially. since dasein is its disclosedness, existentials at once constitute-and-disclose existence as dasein’s being.” being-in, being-alongside, and “they” are examples of existentials. conscience, death and guilt are examples of existential phenomena. the term “existential” must be differentiated from another, similar term – “existentiel”. an existentiel understanding of dasein refers to that being as it is encountered and described in our more immediate, daily experience. heidegger seeks to ground his study of existential dasein in its existentiel understanding. dahlstrom, the heidegger dictionary, p. 70. 6 being-guilty simply implies that, “dasein as such is guilty,” given that guilt is an existential which indicates dasein’s necessary ability to choose between potentialities. being-guilty means that dasein has assumed the responsibility of that choice. ibid., p. 284. 7 ibid. 8 ‘they’ indicates the general crowd, the public opinion which dominates society. heidegger makes clear that the ‘they’ is not anything definite and cannot be viewed as the conglomeration of many individuals. rather the ‘they’ is constituted by the indefinite others into which every dasein sinks by participating in a public culture: transportation, information, etc. its concern is to make everything average. the ‘they’ is an existential, because it is the mode in which dasein exists for the most part; it is dasein’s everyday “being-one’s-self ”. however, it is an inauthentic-self, because as ‘they’ dasein does not act resolutely, but rather ignores its responsibility to guilt and allows others to make its decisions for it. ibid., pp. 127, 271. 46 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college heidegger describes conscience as a call that summons dasein from its fallenness9 to its ownmost potentiality-for-being10 . it is a call that works as a countermeasure to dasein’s “listening away.”11 in its everyday being, dasein is absorbed in the world of the ‘they’ (the worlds of anonymous social groupings or crowds) and heidegger calls this mindless absorption a state of “falling.” in this state, dasein finds itself tempted to surrender its authentic potentiality-for-being12 and submit itself to the interpretation and nearly subliminal control of the ‘they’ as expressed in idle talk,13 curiosity, and ambiguity. concretely then, in its everyday being dasein listens to gossip and reads magazines without ever verifying whether what is said-in-the-talk has any meaningful relationship to the true being of the entity discussed. it abandons itself to a constant interest in the superficial, restlessly seeking “continual novelty and changing encounters,”14 all the while refusing to bring the encountered thing close and understand it. it is always talking and “surmising” 15 about future events and possible courses of action, yet never acts itself. living under the proscription of the ‘they’, dasein is tranquillized into complacency. it loses the desire to make life more challenging and thus avoids facing its ownmost possibility, effectively alienating itself. it looks away from the significance and potentiality of its being, and focuses entirely on things theoretically present-at-hand or practically ready-to9 fallenness is an existential: a particular mode of dasein’s being which describes dasein’s existential state of “being-in” in its everydayness. being-in has three basic existential constituents: attunement(or mood), understanding, and discourse. moods evidence the emotional life of dasein. in moods, dasein discloses to itself that it has been thrown into the world. although “thrown” is a complex concept in heidegger, we can understand it as the fact that the individual dasein exists within a particular place at a particular time with particular people; what heidegger describes as dasein’s facticity. dasein’s mood indicates to dasein that it has been thrown into the world in a certain way. by revealing itself as thrown, dasein’s mood allows for what is encountered within-the-world to matter to dasein. understanding as an existential has to do with understanding the “for-the-sake-of-which” (143) of dasein. heidegger emphasizes that dasein does not exist as a thing before its possibilities, but rather projects possibilities and understands itself through them. in this sense dasein is its possibility existentially. possibility as an existential is not a logical or present-at-hand possibility, but “the most primordial and ultimately positive ontological determinacy of dasein” (143). in understanding, dasein becomes apparent to itself in terms of the referential totality of its potentialities for being. it is essentially “thrown possibility” (143). this potentiality-for-being is inextricably tied to guilt: it does not indicate a conglomeration of hypothetical possibilities, but, instead, indicates the fact that dasein is in every case this potentiality-for-being rather than that one. discourse refers to the fact that dasein’s projection of its possibilities brings it into relation with others as being-with. through discourse dasein expresses itself in terms of its state-of-mind. in this expression, the understanding of the world (of dasein as being-with others and as being-in-the-world) is disclosed to others. fallenness is being-in-the-world as it “maintains itself in the everyday being of the they” (167). fallenness indicates dasein’s basic tendency to conform. dasein is thrown into the public sphere and thus, for the most part, pays attention not to the being of itself, but of the ‘they’. additionally, the ‘they’ hampers dasein’s capacity to understand itself as potentiality-for-being because it appropriates dasein’s possibilities, depriving dasein of its responsibility to decide for itself. ibid., pp. 131-167. 10 ibid., p. 271 11 ibid. 12 ibid., p. 167. 13 idle talk can be understood as the existential of discourse as a character of fallen dasein; it is discourse submitted to the control of the ‘they’. having lost its relationship of being to the entity discussed, discourse becomes mere gossiping. ibid., p. 168. 14 ibid., p. 172 15 ibid., p. 174. 47issue iv f spring 2017 g.k. chesterton and the quest for heideggerian authenticity hand.16 indeed, it often reduces itself to such entities, never bothering to look past a theoretical dissection of its inner workings to the uncomfortable facticity of its potentiality-for-being. nevertheless, it is this very discomfort which calls dasein back from such groundlessness. the call of conscience breaks through public, worldly interpretations to the dasein that has abandoned itself to them. with an ‘alien’ voice, this call recalls dasein to its ownmost potentiality for being, a being accompanied by a feeling of the greatest uncanniness.17 to understand what we mean by this latter term we must first offer a brief description of anxiety. fallen dasein is dasein which, existentially, has not understood itself in terms of its own possibilities. it turns away from a disclosure of itself as, “authentic potentiality-for-being-its-self ”18 and allows for absorption in the concerns of the ‘they’. dasein’s falling, therefore, can be understood as a fleeing away from something threatening. heidegger clarifies that he is not speaking of fleeing as grounded in the mood of fear and evoked in the face of a definite threat (something ready-to-hand or present-at-hand). instead, in falling, dasein flees in the face of itself; in the face of being-in-the-world. this fleeing is grounded in the basic state-of-mind, or mood, which heidegger calls anxiety, and which reveals to dasein the threat imposed by being-in-the-world. as he writes, “that in the face of which one has anxiety is completely indefinite…[i]t tells us that entities within-the-world are not relevant… it is characterized by the fact that what threatens is nowhere.”19 in anxiety, the “nothing and nowhere” of the world become manifest; the entities, or beings, become utterly insignificant. however, this insignificance does not mean the world holds no meaning for dasein. rather, “what oppresses us…is not the summation of everything present-at-hand; it is rather the possibility of the ready-tohand in general; that is to say, it is the world itself.”20 being is anxious in the face of no thing – no specific entity within-the-world. instead, anxiety arises when we face the full horizon of our possibility. 16 an object that is present-at-hand is an object that dasein relates to within the world as a mere fact. whether it is the fact of a physical thing or a theoretical concept, it is something that is present within the world and may be theorized about, but is not used. it differs from an object that is ready to hand and that is related to as something useful and to be implemented or handled. an object ready-to-hand is bound up in a network of references which determine its purpose (traceable finally to the service of dasein). ibid., p. 73-75. it is important, moreover, to distinguish (as heidegger does) between presence and being. he maintains that the history of philosophy has largely equated the two, such that presence has taken on a metaphysical meaning. it intimates “present-ness” and “accessibility to someone here and now.” heidegger argues that the greeks failed to see that they were interpreting being in terms of time and restricting it to the present. thus, they had failed to arrive at a more primordial form of being in which absence is not to be considered. heidegger considers “presence” as the event that, “grounds and affords the coming to presence…[it] encompasses the… having been and the future, since all… are in a way present to us – even… because of the ways they are absent.” dahlstrom, the heidegger dictionary, p. 173. 17 heidegger, being and time, p. 277. 18 ibid., p. 184. 19 ibid., p. 186 20 ibid., p. 187. 48 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college yet dasein is not only anxious in the face of something, but also about something. this “about”, as with “in the face of ”, is no definite being, but rather is being-inthe-world itself.21 in anxiety, the world and all its entities lose their power to define dasein, and that being is thrown back upon its own authentic potentiality-for-being; it is individualized as “being-possible.”22 as heidegger writes, “anxiety makes manifest in dasein its being towards its ownmost potentiality-for-being – that is, its beingfree for the freedom of choosing itself and taking hold of itself.”23 in other words, anxiety emerges when, in the face of its horizon of possibilities, dasein recognizes its guilt – its responsibility of choice. this position of being is a vulnerable and uncomfortable one: “in anxiety one feels uncanny… ‘uncanniness’ also means ‘notbeing-at-home’.”24 guilt, then, is a burden in this sense: though it may become one, it is not necessarily a grievous weight, but rather the discomfort of one’s individual responsibility to choose among possibilities in light of the urgency endowed by one’s ownmost possibility. this position of uncanny discomfort is entirely at odds with the obvious tranquility of the ‘they’, and its comforting assurances of being-at-home. returning to our initial theme of conscience, it is clear now that dasein, uncanny in its anxiety, serves as a countermeasure to the falling of dasein. as dasein attempts to flee mindlessly into the “they”, anxiety grips it and, in this grip, dasein calls itself back to its responsibility of choice before its ownmost possibility. it has been said that anxiety brings dasein before its ownmost potentiality-for-being, but we have yet to explain what this potential is. simply, it is death. according to heidegger, death is not a truncating end or conclusion to dasein, but rather a fundamentally individual possibility of impossibility. it is the possibility of a point at which dasein will no longer be free to choose from its grand horizon of possibilities.25 being-towards-death26 , which heidegger calls anticipation, is essentially allowing oneself to be open to the threat arising from the throwness of one’s being: the threat that one has been thrown into the world to die and that one must choose one’s possibilities in the face of this ultimate fact. however, this threat is not negative, for because of it, dasein is called back to an authentic state-of-being in which its possibilities are freed for their truth. anxiety, as the state-of-mind which holds open (or stands before) the threat of dasein’s ownmost possibility, drags dasein back from 21 ibid. 22 ibid., p. 188. 23 ibid. 24 ibid., p. 189 25 death is an existential possibility which is present to dasein in every moment. death makes itself present (in the sense of presence explained above) in the present as a possibility of being impending on dasein. furthermore, it is dasein’s ownmost possibility. ownmost as it is used by heidegger means that which belongs most closely to oneself. of every possibility dasein possesses, death is the most personal. no one can die for you, and thus it is the one thing dasein must inevitably do for itself. the fundamental characteristics of death are: ownmost, not-shared, not-to-be-overtaken, certain, and indeterminate. due to lack of space to address these aspects individually, they are simply assumed and occasionally referenced in this paper. 26 being-towards-death indicates that dasein, in its being, concerns itself over death as a possibility. it is not brooding over or theorizing about death; rather, it indicates a way of relating to death as each dasein’s ownmost possibility; it is the anticipation of this possibility. ibid., p. 260. 49issue iv f spring 2017 g.k. chesterton and the quest for heideggerian authenticity fallenness in the call of conscience. in other words, anxiety brings dasein into an authentic state of being.27 moreover, death grants dasein liberty, for by making dasein’s possibilities stand out in the horizon of existence, it frees it. for example, world travel is always a possibility, yet one usually absent from the thoughts of the everyday man. tell this man that he will soon die, and suddenly the possibility which was always present – but never understood – stands out as a copper relief from its setting. at this point, death’s purpose in our grand scheme should be apparent: in being-towards-death, dasein becomes capable of living authentically, free to choose from the full range of its possibilities. we are now ready to rejoin our discussion on the topic of resoluteness. conscience is the call which summons dasein away from its fallenness to stand before its potentialityfor-being. its voice belongs to the being most alien to fallen dasein, namely, dasein “individualized down to itself in uncanniness and […] thrown into ‘nothing’.”28 hearing this voice – or summons – correctly means, “having an understanding of oneself in one’s ownmost potentiality-for-being – that is… projecting oneself upon one’s ownmost authentic potentiality for becoming guilty.” 29in other words, conscience calls one to recognize the fact of one’s responsibility of choice in light of one’s ownmost potentiality for death. understanding the call is choosing to have a conscience, i.e. wanting to be called to an undertaking of this anxious, burdensome responsibility of choice. in this wanting to have a conscience, dasein is disclosed, and it is this disclosedness of our possibilities that we call resoluteness. resoluteness essentially entails the projection of possibilities in relation to guilt. called in anxiety to an openness before our responsibility of choosing possibilities (in view of death), we project actual possibilities: we choose; we live authentically. part ii i will now argue that g.k chesterton understood the phenomenon of conscience and fallenness that we have outlined above. in his novel the ball and the cross, chesterton presents characters whose persistence in conflict, and eventual friendship, set them apart from the crowd. indeed, their entire story centers around the imminent possibility of death, and the way in which their authentic choices and interactions 27 dasein’s existence may be lived authentically or inauthentically because it understands itself as the possibility of being itself or not. existentially, dasein is its possibility. anxiety brings dasein face to face with its being-free for its possibilities, the ownmost of which is death. because dasein relates to its being in terms of “its ownmost possibility”, “it can lose and find itself ” (38, 42). this is because dasein’s potential to be authentic or inauthentic corresponds to certain existentiel possibilities. what those particular existentiel possibilities may be differs from person to person and, therefore, it is impossible to state exactly what form an authentic existentiel possibility takes. nevertheless this much is certain: dasein’s authentic being necessitates it face its potentiality-for-being in view of the urgency bestowed by its ownmost possibility (death). the existentiel possibilities which it then chooses will be ones in which dasein finds itself and acts according to the truth of its being. ibid., pp. 38-42. 28 ibid., p. 277 29 ibid., p. 287. 50 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college constitute a marked difference from the ‘they’.30 to begin this discussion i will offer a summary of the novel. evan macian, a stolid catholic hailing from scotland, arrives in london one afternoon, and after wandering around the large city, eventually finds himself outside the editorial office of the atheist. absentmindedly, the young catholic begins to read a paper pasted to the window, and, therein discovering blasphemy against the virgin mary, shatters the glass and challenges the surprised editor within to a duel. the editor’s name is james turnbull, and as fervently as macian follows the tenets of his catholic faith, turnbull declares the triumph of atheism and the death of god. however, in this initial encounter between the two, one element of their respective creeds becomes starkly apparent: their beliefs are not ideologies which, having been subscribed to, have closed the men off, but, rather, are the reason for an authentic relationship with one another. indeed, far from being enraged by his damaged property, turnbull turns, “deadly pale with pleasure” and is happy that “someone was angry with the paper”31 ; he is happy that at last he has an opportunity for authentic dialogue. joyously accepting macian’s proposal for a duel, the two make preparations for a fight to the death in defense of their respective creeds. yet, the passionate scotsmen (for that nationality encompasses both) find themselves continually baffled in the attempt to engage. any two men willing to engage so authentically over the ‘trivial’ motive of religion must be mad. hence, their story unfolds as a grand chase across britain with the police and public on their tails. each time the men begin to fence, something or someone prevents them, leading to an encounter with a series of unusual, or rather, uncomfortably usual, characters. in the end, turnbull and macian are tricked into an asylum from which there is no escape. after a period of solitary isolation, they emerge to discover that every individual encountered along their way has been made an inmate alongside them. this discovery leads to a concluding confrontation with the master of the asylum, and the end of the novel. one of the main themes of this book is the way in which the general obviousness of public interpretation obscures the meaning of the scots’ duel. it amounts to a description of what heidegger would label the “fallenness” of dasein. the reduction of the believers’ meaningful feud is made especially clear after the gentlemen’s first attempt at a fight to the death is checked by police interference. having satisfied readers as to the safe escape of the protagonists, chesterton launches into an account of journalism and the manner in which newspapers responded to the cataclysmic event of a religious duel: 30 two aspects are worthy of note regarding our following discussion. the first is that, in examining the resoluteness of the scotsmen, we are essentially displaying an example of existentiel authenticity. the second is that, because these characters are chesterton’s productions, they reveal primarily the thought of that author, and are thus removed from an observation of people actually existing in the world. 31 chesterton, g.k, the ball and the cross (sioux falls: nuvision publications, llc, 2008), p. 22. 51issue iv f spring 2017 g.k. chesterton and the quest for heideggerian authenticity “whatever secret and elvish thing it is that broods over editors and suddenly turns their brains, that thing had seized on the story of the broken glass and the duel in the garden…. mr. macian, one of the combatants, became for some mysterious reason, singly and hugely popular as a comic figure… he was always represented…with red whiskers… letters under the heading “where are they” poured into every paper… running them to earth in the monument, twopenny tube, epping forest, westminster abbey….”32 this description bears fascinating similarities to heidegger’s account of “idle talk”, a characteristic of fallenness. in the scribbling of various journals it becomes impossible to verify whether what has been said is, or is not, factically true. macian is neither comic nor red-haired, and as the scotsmen read the newspapers they are seated not in any of the locations announced, but on a hill to the north of london. there is no way, however, for the common newspaper reader to know that. what has been said-in-the-talk, or in this case, written in the articles, has become its own subject, severed from the being of the entities discussed and passed around to a public which accepts the script without question. this fake form of dialogue has closed off and covered up the facticity of macian’s challenge. truth has not been challenged as a lie, but dismissed as a joke. the words have garbled the facts, and readers not bothering to confirm have stopped at the garbling. chesterton beautifully demonstrates the difference between fallen dasein attempting to play the part of public conscience and an authentic being’s understanding of that call. the first character whom macian and turnbull meet on their journey is described in his chapter title as a “philosopher of love”. coming across the duelists as they join swords, the man recognizes them from what he has read in the papers, and in the manner of multiple thinkers whom he names, attempts to “appeal to [their] higher natures”. at one point in his empty overture, the man remarks, “well, we won’t quarrel about a word,” immediately sparking a vehement reaction from macian. “what is the good of words if they aren’t important enough to quarrel over? why do we choose one word more than another if there isn’t any difference between them?”33 macian’s reply is a direct refutation of idle talk and its interpretation. while the philosopher of love would simply forward vague conceptions of right or wrong, macian demands a relationship between discourse and the true being of entities. in light of this, his response to the philosopher’s drawn out monologue regarding moral planes and the power of love to breed love is understandable: “talk about the principle of love as much as you like. you seem to me colder than a lump of stone; but i am willing to believe that you may at some time have loved a cat…but don’t you talk about christianity… it is a thing that has made men slay and torture each other; and you will never 32 ibid., p. 78. 33 ibid., p. 51. 52 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college know why… hate it, in god’s name, as turnbull does, who is a man. it is a monstrous thing, for which men die.”34 in being and time, heidegger asserts that conscience, wrongly interpreted as power, passes itself off as, “recognizing the call in the sense of a voice which is ‘universally’ binding.” it is upon just such a ‘universal,’ ideological concept of love and nature that chesterton’s philosopher has grounded his appeal: and it is on this ground that macian objects. as heidegger writes later, “a ‘world-conscience’ is a dubious fabrication, and dasein can come to this only because conscience, in its basis and its essence, is in each case mine.”35 this is precisely the flaw which macian points out in the man’s argument. conscience, by being mine, is something that rises from within and recalls me to myself; it has nothing to do with abstract concepts i have never experienced. unlike macian and turnbull, whose beliefs are authentically theirs, the philosopher of love preaches something about which he has theorized, but has never made his own. as such, his appeal is empty, removed from any truth authenticated by his being. although the dialogue and action of chesterton’s characters largely confirm heidegger’s take on the difference between authentic and fallen dasein, they likewise emphasize a missing element in his conception of resoluteness and death. in analyzing the motives of the novel’s characters, chesterton’s stance becomes clear: it is not enough for one to resolutely project possibilities in relation to guilt; one must also stand for something before death – otherwise, dasein’s freedom is simply the freedom to be miserable. one of the characters encountered along the gentlemen’s path is a young, beautiful woman, nameless until the novel’s conclusion. after saving the men from the police, the young woman speaks in the following way, evidencing by her words both the power of resoluteness and the necessity for a reason to be so: “god knows i have had no pleasure in my life, though i am pretty and young and father has plenty of money. and then people come and tell me that i ought to do things and i do them and it’s all drivel…i am to save children from death, and i am not even certain that i should not be better off dead… it seems to me …that there is no way of being happy… but i may be wrong… i felt that, after all, you had got the way out and that was why the world hated you. you see, if there were a way out, it would be sure to be something that looked very queer.”36 the girl’s words elicit three facts. firstly, the uncanniness of anxiety is at work, betraying itself in her unhappiness. secondly, this anxiety has not induced her to project her own possibilities or to be resolute. this last fact is a curious one, for it 34 ibid., p. 52. 35 heidegger, being and time, p. 278. 36 chesterton, the ball and the cross, p. 94. 53issue iv f spring 2017 g.k. chesterton and the quest for heideggerian authenticity illustrates a deficiency in heidegger’s description of resoluteness. the girl is plainly aware of the call of conscience. her manner of speaking about death, moreover, shows that she views it neither with tranquility nor horror, but as the factical impossibility of her possibility. furthermore, she is acutely aware that the public proposal of the ‘they’ is not a course of action which appeals to her authentic being and she longs for some possibility in the projection of which she might be resolute. yet, for all this, she cannot form a resolution: her pessimistic understanding of death fails to free her possibilities, and her guilt as ground for resolution is barren, since she has no reason to choose one course over another. faced with this anxious responsibility of choice, yet lacking anything to stand for, the burden of her guilt becomes what it is not for the authentically resolute; it becomes a grievous weight. she has nothing to be resolute for in the face of death: would it not be better then, to be dead? considering this burden, the woman’s encounter with resolution is fascinating. in his section on resoluteness, heidegger declares that resolute dasein, in light of its chosen potentiality for being, “frees itself for its world,” making it possible both to let others “be,” and to become the “conscience” of others.37 at this point, it should be clear that the scotsmen are authentically resolute. their fatal challenge demonstrates that the projection of each man is grounded upon his embrace of his own, personal responsibility for choice among possibilities made free by the facticity of death. the men act in whatever way appears fitting to their authentic being: they evade the law; they dialogue hotly with interlocutors; they challenge each other in a fight to the death. every possibility is open to them – and in fact, they choose these possibilities – not because they disdain civilization, but because living authentically (with regard to guilt and in light of death) means recognizing that each possibility matters, and that we must act upon those that correspond to our authentic being. for these men, guilt is not grievous, but a personal challenge concerning the urgency of their choice. as turnbull declares toward the beginning of the book: “we must fight this thing out somewhere; because, as you truly say, we have found each other’s reality. we must kill each other – or convert each other.”38 in the encounter with these men, the woman has met resoluteness, and moreover been called by it. this, then, is the third fact: the resolution39 of the scotsmen has acted as a more effective conscience than her own, for unlike her uncanniness, their duel expresses a proposal: a reason, a thing worth fighting for. 37 heidegger, being and time, p. 344. 38 at one point in his book, heidegger writes, “along with the sober anxiety which brings us face to face with our individualized potentiality-for-being, there goes an armed joy in this possibility” (310). although chesterton never explicitly displays his protagonists dealing with the burden of anxiety, he does make one aspect of their characters manifest: they are not at home. the ball and the cross is primarily an account of two men’s rebellion against the public and all its tranquil homeliness. readers see clearly, moreover, that within this very rebellion the men engage themselves, others, and the world around them with a fierce positivity. it is apparent then, that chesterton understands existentiel authenticity to take a similar form to that which heidegger ascribes to it. 39 the term ‘resolution’ is here employed in place of ‘resoluteness’, because resoluteness is not a rigid position. before every possibility, dasein has the capacity of choosing resolutely – of reaffirming its authenticity. thus two resolutions, though both authentic, may not resemble each other. our argument, as put forward above, nevertheless remains the same: in order to make an authentic resolution – to choose in awareness of our full responsibility – we must have a reason to do so. 54 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college this theme is referenced again towards the end of the novel. the master of the asylum gathers everyone together and declares that, in the interest of handling such a trivial truth as that of a religious duel (which, nonetheless, had so discomfited the populace), the story of macian’s challenge had been researched and declared a fable. accordingly, every person who had testified that they had come across the duo had therefore been diagnosed as pathological and placed in the asylum’s care. the master’s statement is interpretable as a literary confirmation of the ‘they’s’ control. though perhaps unrealistic in its abrupt development, the storyline emphasizes the challenge which authentic lives present to public tranquility, and a firm intent to cover them up. however, in the interest of such denial, any authentic mode of being-with one another must be denied. among the individuals locked in the asylum is a man, durand, whose life has been a demonstration of authenticity. “simply a man,” he has lived with his potentiality-forbeing in mind, and made every existentiel decision in view of his ownmost possibility. he genuinely understands himself as the man of rousseau’s social contract, and therefore projects his possibilities authentically, finding himself in them. immediately before the master’s speech, recognizing that his situation in life has fallen “below the comfort of barbarism,” durand demands that a psychologist admit that the social contract has been annulled. the doctor, considering the matter irrelevant, acknowledges that it has. durand exits, returning only after he has set the building aflame “in accordance with the strict principles of the social contract.”40 before fleeing the scene, the doctors betray a moment’s irresolution, crying out, “how do you know we shall go?”, but macian’s response silences them: “you believe nothing…and you are insupportably afraid of death.”41 his simple statement speaks volumes. while the doctors, failing to understand the nature of death, reduce it to something merely to be feared, durand, macian, turnbull, and every other individual locked in the asylum see it as that in light of which their own possibilities are given meaning. they can make the decision to stand true to their beliefs because they believe in something worth acting for in view of death: be it catholicism, its opposite, the social contract, or the simple fact of their challenged truth. the “lunatics” are authentic for a reason. over the course of this discussion, i hope that it has become evident not only what heidegger’s particular thoughts are regarding fallenness, anxiety, conscience, guilt and resolution, but also that chesterton largely affirms his position regarding these matters(and the forms they adopt in an existentiel sense). however, it should likewise be obvious that, by emphasizing a connection between one’s reason for choosing a possibility, and the fact of one’s authentically doing so, chesterton has revealed a gap in heidegger’s philosophy. according to the latter, one must merely be called by uncanniness to an openness before death, for one to project possibilities authentically and responsibly. yet, chesterton maintains that this is not enough. for, even if 40 ibid., p. 197 41 ibid., p. 197 55issue iv f spring 2017 g.k. chesterton and the quest for heideggerian authenticity dasein allows its listening to be directed away from the “they” by anxiety, it will fail to embrace its guilt: it will not choose without a reason to do so – without a belief worth dying for. f bibliography chesterton, g.k. the ball and the cross. sioux falls: nuvision publications, llc, 2008. dahlstrom, daniel o. the heidegger dictionary. new york: bloomsbury publishing plc, 2013. heidegger, martin. being and time. new york: harper & row, 1962. 25issue iv f spring 2017 δι αν οι α 25 the fructifying ray: considering kandinskian artistic creation through the hegelian alienated consciousness martin fitzgerald “the world sounds. it is a cosmos of spiritually affective beings.” 1 introduction at a particular time necessities come to fruition. i.e., the creating spirit (which one can call the abstract spirit) finds access to the [individual] soul, subsequently to [many] souls, and calls forth a longing, an inner compulsion. if those conditions are fulfilled which are necessary for a precise form to come to maturity, then this longing, this inner compulsion is empowered to create a new value in the human mind, which, consciously or unconsciously, begins to live within man. consciously or unconsciously, from this moment man seeks a material form for this new spiritual value that lives in spiritual form within him. thus the spiritual value seeks its materialization. matter is here a reserve of supplies from which the spirit, like a cook, selects what is n e c e s s a r y in this case. 1 wassily kandinsky, “on the question of form,” in kandinsky: complete writings on art, kenneth c. lindsay and peter vergo, eds. (new york: da capo press, 1994), p. 250. 26 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college this is the positive, the creative [element]. this is the good, t h e w h i t e, f r u c t i f y i n g r a y. this white ray leads to evolution, to sublimation. thus, behind matter, within matter, the creative spirit lies concealed.2 this short passage both encapsulates many of kandinsky’s major philosophical themes including the internal-external division, the principle of inner necessity, the creating spirit, and artistic evolution and also highlights the difficulty in grounding kandinsky on a systematic theory of artistic creation. it is difficult to understand the transition from the first inner longing to a concrete contribution to spiritual progress. in particular, it is not clear what this spiritual value is, how it actually becomes materialized, or how the artist selects the necessary matter to materialize it. to address this, i want to call attention to three processes which i will call discernment, wherein the artist realizes what his or her spiritual value is; translation, wherein the artist transforms the spiritual value into a form appropriate to be embodied in an artistic composition; and crafting, wherein the artist physically creates his or her composition. guiding each of these processes is what kandinsky calls the ‘creating spirit.’ i will also look at the work of g.w.f. hegel in order to help supplement kandinsky’s notion of spirit and to articulate how discernment, translation, and crafting bring a ‘spiritually-purposive goal’ into being. as we will see, this triadic structure demonstrates the path by which the artist alienates his consciousness from himself in the work of art in order that it may again confront him as an externalized force so as to drive spiritual progress. in order to make sense of this structure, i will begin by discussing the hegelian geist, the way in which geist alienates from itself, and the way in which alienation contributes to geist’s development. this portion of the hegelian dialectic will provide a lens through which to interpret kandinsky’s theory. using this lens, i will discuss kandinsky’s vision of human spiritual progress because every spiritually-purposive goal derives from the artist’s position in the collective spiritual atmosphere. against this backdrop, i will isolate the kandinskian creating spirit and locate its position alongside what kandinsky calls the inner need. from here, i will explain the triadic structure of discernment, translation, and crafting in order to demonstrate how the artist produces spiritually-purposive artwork. finally, i will explain how the process of alienation ends with recuperation whereby the artistic composition returns feedback into the mind of the spectator to produce concrete spiritual progress. constructing a hegelian lens hegel’s system of philosophy follows the historically-conditioned path of consciousness toward absolute knowing and absolute spirit (the mind that knows and has itself fully as its own subject). for hegel, consciousness, particularly human 2 ibid., p. 235. the unusual spacing is transcribed from kandinsky’s own writing. 27issue iv f spring 2017 the fructifying ray consciousness, is the embodiment of reason in the world. the collective embodiment of reason in historically-conditioned consciousness is termed geist. hegel believes that geist by its very nature follows a path through which truth unfolds. such a path inevitably takes consciousness out of union with the natural world and into a state of alienation, a fissure that consciousness eventually reunites. hegel draws upon the judeo-christian concept of the fall to explain this point: upon a closer inspection of the story of the fall we find, as was already said, that it exemplifies the universal bearings of knowledge upon the spiritual life. in its instinctive and natural stage, spiritual life wears the garb of innocence and confiding simplicity; but the very essence of spirit implies the absorption of this immediate condition in something higher. the spiritual is distinguished from the natural, and more especially from the animal, life, in the circumstance that it does not continue a mere stream of tendency, but sunders itself to self−realisation. but this position of severed life has in its turn to be suppressed, and the spirit has by its own act to win its way to concord again. the final concord then is spiritual; that is, the principle of restoration is found in thought, and thought only. the hand that inflicts the wound is also the hand which heals it.3 consciousness not only brings itself out of natural harmony, but also brings itself back into harmony with nature. the reunion with nature is done through a transformation of nature. to “win its way to concord again,” spirit: impregnates the external world with his will. thereby he humanises his environment, by showing how it is capable of satisfying him and how it cannot preserve any power of independence against him. only by means of this effectual activity is he no longer merely in general, but also in particular and in detail, actually aware of himself and at home in his environment.4 in order to shape the world in its own image, the human consciousness performs work. with work, consciousness shapes an external object in such a way that it can recognize itself in the object: man brings himself before himself by practical activity, since he has the impulse, in whatever is given to him, in what is present to him externally, to produce himself and therein equally to recognise himself. this aim he achieves by altering external things whereon he impresses the seal of his inner being and in which he now finds again his own characteristics. man does this in order, as a free subject, to strip the external world of its inflexible foreignness and to enjoy in the shape of things only an external realisation of himself.5 3 g.w.f. hegel, hegel’s logic, trans. william wallace (london: oxford university press, 1975), p. 24. 4 g.w.f. hegel, aesthetics: lectures on fine art, trans. t.m. knox (oxford: clarendon press, 1975), p. 256. 5 ibid. 28 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college this process by which “he impresses the seal of his inner being and in which he now finds again his own characteristics,” hegel calls alienation6. in this process of alienation it is not merely the external world which is changed. as rae notes, alienation provides the consciousness an ability to view itself in a way that it would otherwise not have access to, thereby changing it in the process.7 the alienated consciousness is like a mirror which reflects back to the subject what his or her consciousness must really be like in the first place. pippin points out that “we don’t know, in any determinate or ‘living’ detail, who we actually take ourselves to be except in such externalization, either in action or in such material productions as artworks.”8 in this ‘mirror reflection,’ consciousness sees not only itself, but also a collective consciousness of geist in the larger sense. individual consciousness, as hegel claims, is essentially constituted by historical processes, which play out on a societal level. history begins with the break from immediate nature, and, from this point, consciousness itself begins its historical development. this is to say that the very nature of consciousness is constituted by historical, societal forces. as such, even when consciousness is afforded the opportunity to gaze upon itself, it necessarily always sees, knowingly or unknowingly, the society which has formed it into its current state. within hegel’s work, alienation is understood in two senses. alienation is the english word chosen for what are in reality two german words: entfremdung and entaüsserung. rae associates the two words as follows: entfremdung describes a process or state where consciousness is separated from, at least, one of the aspects that are required for consciousness to fully understand itself. in contract, ‘entaüsserung’ describes the process whereby consciousness externalizes itself in object form and, through this objectification, develops a better understanding of itself.9 these two uses of the word are interrelated. entfremdung, the state of the consciousness before it properly knows its own nature as the universal self, is the state of consciousness after the fall. sayers notes, as is consistent with this reading, that this sense of “alienation can and will be overcome when spirit has completed its development and come to be at home in the world.”10 to progress to where consciousness is at home again in the world, consciousness needs to use entaüsserung. entaüsserung is the way in which the conscious subject puts his consciousness before himself in an object in order to be able to observe what his own consciousness is like to gain a better understanding of it. the two senses of alienation are interrelated insofar 6 ibid. 7 gavin rae, “hegel, alienation, and the phenomenological development of consciousness,” international journal of philosophical studies 20.1 (february 10, 2012), p. 24. 8 robert b. pippin, after the beautiful: hegel and the philosophy of pictorial modernism, (chicago: the university of chicago press, 2014), p. 41. 9 ibid. 10 sean sayers, “creative activity and alienation in hegel and marx,” historical materialism 11.1 (2003), p. 120. 29issue iv f spring 2017 the fructifying ray as the understanding afforded by entaüsserung helps reunite the split of consciousness in entfremdung. although aspects of kandinsky’s thought resonate with both of these senses of alienation, the focus of this paper is on entaüsserung, hereafter referred to simply as alienation. alienation takes place in all categories of work, one of which, artistic work, will be the focus of this paper. even though kandinsky is concerned with artistic work, there is no particular need to invoke pieces of art as distinct from other kinds of objects from a hegelian perspective for this analysis. in other words, although hegel has an entire separate theory of aesthetics, we can use hegelian alienation as a framework for art as a general type of work. if we do as such, then a piece of art is no longer particularly distinct from another object arising from work. art itself can be understood as a type of work, for work itself finds “its highest expression … in the free creative activity of art.”11 artistic creation is still itself an act of work. although hegel does clearly draw a distinction between art and other types of objects, the point here is to look at how art is a kind of work and trace alienation within that work. pippin writes that artistic creation involves alienation as it has been defined above: very roughly, hegel’s view was that the production or “externalization” of our ideas in artworks represents a distinct and, until very recently, indispensable form of selfknowledge. his unusual phrase is that the human being, understood as geist, must “double itself ” (sich verdoppeln) (a, 1:31) … and with that one characterization, we are already in uncharted waters; art does not double or imitate reality as in so many mimetic theories, but rather in art, geist, some sort of achieved collective likemindedness, doubles itself.12 thus, it seems fitting to consider the art object in this context. on a basic level, artistic creation is similar to other acts of work insofar as it is the act by which consciousness externalizes itself in order to see and better understand itself as well as to craft the world in its own image. although it is not necessary to invoke hegel’s aesthetics, it is necessary to give special attention to the art object within kandinsky’s work. hegel’s philosophy provides the opportunity to see the artist as one kind of worker and to see artistic creation as a kind of work alongside other kinds of work. while, again, art is a special kind of work, it still belongs to the general category of work. kandinsky’s writings, however, do not provide this opportunity: in them, artistic creation is necessarily artistic in quality. there is no larger reference to work as a category in kandinsky’s theory. however, hegel’s notion of work can provide this more general category. alienation provides a hegelian lens through which to observe how artistic creation works in kandinsky’s theory. in particular, i want to consider the way in which the doubling of consciousness serves as a framework to understand kandinsky’s creative process. 11 sayers, “creative activity and alienation in hegel and marx,” p. 113. 12 pippin, after the beautiful, p. 32. 30 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college the artist as noted above, the artist is one particular type of determination of consciousness capable of performing work. although in hegel’s theory any consciousness can perform work which doubles itself, kandinsky gives an account of the creative process as it relates specifically to an artist. the general mechanisms of hegelian consciousness, such as self-discovery through alienation, are very much still present within the kandinskian artist, but with kandinsky’s view the artist does a more specific kind of work. this work is artistic work, what kandinsky calls the creative act. in the world of spirit,13 kandinsky regards the creative act as essential because art is an irreplaceable instrument in humanity’s shared spiritual progress.14 the artist, being the one who creates art, is thus a necessary part of spiritual progress himself both through creating individual compositions, as well as using a lifetime’s effort to achieve a larger goal. the artist’s very existence is meant not to serve his own aims, but rather he exists “exclusively for the sake of the spectator, because the artist is the slave of humanity.”15 indeed, the artist: has a threefold responsibility: (1) he must render up again that talent which has been bestowed upon him; (2) his actions and thoughts and feelings, like those of every human being, constitute the spiritual atmosphere, in such a way that they purify or infect the spiritual air; and (3) these actions and thoughts and feelings are the material for his creations, which likewise play a part in constituting the spiritual atmosphere. he is a ‘king’, as sar peladan calls him, not only in the sense that he has a great power, but also in that he has great responsibilities.16 the kind of art which the artist creates in order to effect spiritual progress, kandinsky calls spiritually-purposive art. indeed, kandinsky believes that an artist has a committal responsibility to the non-artist to create spiritually-purposive art. why is it that the artist occupies such a privileged position for kandinsky? there are two compelling reasons: one, that the artist is sensitive enough to hear the call of what kandinsky calls the creating spirit, and two, that the artist is effectively able to alienate his consciousness into an art object through the creative act in such a way that it makes the call of the creating spirit perceptible to a spectator. the artist’s sensitivity to the creating spirit is, in a word, the ability of the artist to determine what spiritual value is necessary to drive spiritual progress. as a gloss, paul klee’s simile of the tree is a useful comparison. the kandinskian creating spirit is like the root system of klee’s tree: 13 not to be confused with the hegelian spirit. as written with a lowercase “s,” this refers to kandinsky’s understanding of spirit. 14 wassily kandinsky, “on the spiritual in art,” in kandinsky: complete writings on art, kenneth c. lindsay and peter vergo, eds. (new york: da capo press, 1994), p. 212. 15 wassily kandinsky, “on the artist,” in kandinsky: complete writings on art, kenneth c. lindsay and peter vergo, eds. (new york: da capo press, 1994), p. 418. 16 kandinsky, on the spiritual in art, pp. 213-214. 31issue iv f spring 2017 the fructifying ray the artist has studied this world of variety and has, we may suppose, unobtrusively found his way in it. his sense of direction has brought order into the passing stream of image and experience. this sense of direction in nature and life, this branching and spreading array, i shall compare with the root of the tree. from the root the sap flows to the artist, flows through him, flows to his eye. thus he stands as the trunk of the tree. battered and stirred by the strength of the flow, he moulds his vision into his work … nobody would affirm that the tree grows its crown in the image of its root. between above and below can be no mirrored reflection. it is obvious that different functions expanding in different elements must produce vital divergences … standing at his [the artist’s] appointed place, the trunk of the tree, he does nothing other than gather and pass on what comes to him from the depths. he neither serves nor rules – he transmits. his position is humble. and the beauty at the crown is not his own. he is merely a channel.17 with this line of thought, the artist is said to draw from his or her surrounding life and transmit it into the crown of the tree, which is the artistic composition. in a similar way, the creating spirit is “one’s inner impulse … [that] will inexorably create at the right moment the form it finds necessary,”18 to give expression to some content. just as with the roots of klee’s tree, the kandinskian creating spirit draws from the “passing stream,” which is in this case the collective spiritual atmosphere that kandinsky describes as the “spiritual triangle.”19 from the spiritual triangle, the creating spirit “calls forth a … spiritual value [which] seeks its materialization.”20 kandinsky does not explicitly state what the content of such a value is or could be, but nevertheless insists that “art in general is not a mere purposeless creating of things that dissipate themselves in a void, but a power that has a purpose and must serve the development and refinement of the human soul – the movement of the triangle.”21 if spiritually-purposive art is created both to materialize a spiritual value (and no other thing22 ), as well as to raise the spiritual triangle, then the spiritual value is one which, when materialized, directs itself towards raising the spiritual triangle. the process of materialization – the creative act – takes place through a hegelian alienation of the artist’s consciousness into the artistic composition. in this process, the artist, through contact with the creating spirit, must first determine what spiritual value is necessary and suitable to express. then, the artist must comprehend the way in which this value is capable of being materialized in an artistic composition. finally, the artist must then proceed to make this composition. when performed correctly, 17 paul klee, on modern art, trans. paul findlay (london: faber and faber, 1966), pp. 13-15. 18 wassily kandinsky, “cologne lecture,” in kandinsky: complete writings on art, kenneth c. lindsay and peter vergo, eds. (new york: da capo press, 1994), p. 396. 19 see section the spiritual triangle 20 kandinsky, “on the question of form,” p. 235. 21 kandinsky, on the spiritual in art, p. 212. 22 kandinsky acknowledges that many different forces affect the production of a piece of art but nevertheless states that only the inner spiritual value is the true goal of the piece of art. epoch, personality, and so forth give rise to artistic expression, but are not the goal of a piece of art. 32 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college the artist produces a spiritually-purposive composition which embodies his or her externalized consciousness. the spiritual triangle spiritually-purposive art is only spiritually-purposive if it contributes to the advancement of the collective spiritual atmosphere. kandinsky elaborates this viewpoint in the first four chapters of on the spiritual in art with the simile of the “spiritual triangle.”23 all of humanity’s collective spiritual life: can be accurately represented by a diagram of a large acute triangle divided into unequal parts, with the most acute and smallest division at the top. the farther down one goes, the larger, broader, more extensive and deeper become the divisions of the triangle. the whole triangle moves slowly, barely perceptibly, forward and upward so that where the highest point is ‘today’; the next division is ‘tomorrow,’ i.e. what is today comprehensible only to the topmost segment of the triangle and to the rest of the triangle is gibberish, becomes tomorrow the sensible and emotional content of the life of the second segment.24 due to the geometry of the triangle, there are fewer and fewer people in each level as the apex is approached; the majority of people fall within one of the lower levels. at the very top level “stands sometimes only a single man”25 who, through his efforts alone, brings the triangle towards tomorrow. this person is analogous to hegel’s notion of the world-historical individual. world-historical individuals are “agents of the world-spirit,” meaning that they have “an insight into the requirements of the time.”26 this was the very truth for their age, for their world; the species next in order, so to speak, and which was already formed in the womb of time. it was theirs to know this nascent principle; the necessary, directly sequent step in progress, which their world was to take; to make this their aim, and to expend their energy in promoting it. world-historical men – the heroes of an epoch – must, therefore, be recognized as its clear-sighted ones; their deeds, their words are the best of that time.27 kandinsky locates the apex of the triangle similarly. the visionary at the apex hears the voice of spirit and opens the way to “the spiritual bread for the spiritual awakening now beginning.”28 his progress is a progress for all in that the work of the visionary advances the triangle absolutely. even if the fruits of his innovations are 23 kandinsky, on the spiritual in art, p. 133. 24 ibid. 25 ibid. 26 hegel, g.w.f., the philosophy of history. ontario: batoche books, 1900. https://www.marxists.org/reference/ archive/hegel/works/hi/introduction-lectures.htm#s1. 27 ibid. 28 kandinsky, on the spiritual in art, p. 138. 33issue iv f spring 2017 the fructifying ray not immediately felt by all, the progress still stands as a universal progress. however, not everyone has direct access to this progress. instead, it is the unique role of the artist to make spiritual values available to non-artists. just like non-artists, kandinsky notes that artists have different degrees of spiritual development and as such reside in different segments of the triangle. thus: in every division of the triangle, one can find artists. every one of them who is able to see beyond the frontiers of his own segment is the prophet of his environment, and helps the forward movement of the obstinate cartload of humanity. … it is obvious that every such segment hungers – consciously or (much more often) completely unconsciously – after its corresponding spiritual bread. this bread is given it by its artists, and tomorrow the next segment will reach for that same bread.29 and, in this way, the progress of the apex is ostensibly the progress of all. once the apex has broken into new ground, the new ground is separated from others only by a train of “tomorrows.” kandinsky believes that all pure art is spiritually-purposive art, which is to say that all pure art furthers the advance of the spiritual triangle. according to kandinsky, art is uniquely and exclusively positioned to perform this function. thus, “art is for this reason indispensable and purposeful,”30 because “there is no other power that can replace art.”31 just, then, as work is crucial to the development of geist, so too is the creative act crucial to the development of kandinskian spirit. if spiritual progress requires the production of art, then a form of work, the work which produces art, is necessary to raise the spiritual triangle. this work must take the creating spirit and inner need as its guidance, proceeding from contact with the spiritual triangle. composition an artistic composition is the material result of the creative act. in it resides the artist’s externalized consciousness in the form of a concrete pictorial goal. a composition is distinct from the more general term ‘art object.’ kandinsky offers several different definitions for the word, each of which slightly different from, but not excluding, the others. first, a composition is “the internally purposive subordination of individual elements [and] of the structure to a concrete pictorial goal.”32 the elements themselves are defined as “the concrete result produced by force operating upon the material,” where “tensions, for their part, give expression to the inner sound of the element.”33 29 ibid., p. 134. 30 wassily kandinsky, “on stage composition,” in kandinsky: complete writings on art, kenneth c. lindsay and peter vergo, eds. (new york: da capo press, 1994), p. 258. 31 kandinsky, on the spiritual in art, p. 212. 32 wassily kandinsky, point and line to plane, in kandinsky: complete writings on art, kenneth c. lindsay and peter vergo, eds. (new york: da capo press, 1994), p. 552. 33 ibid, p. 611. 34 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college thus it is also appropriate to call a composition “the logically precise organization of … living forces encapsulated within elements in the guise of tensions.”34 an element’s inner sound is a “spiritual being possessing qualities which are identical to that form.”35 these inner sounds are what communicate with the spectator spiritually. in addition to internal effect produced by inner sound, every color, form, and object in a composition also has an external effect. kandinsky’s writing is concerned with measuring internal effect through external forms, and not with measuring external effect itself. inner sounds awaken movements in the spirit through the sense which experiences the art. for example, kandinsky describes “color [as] a means of exerting a direct influence upon the soul. color is the keyboard. the eye is the hammer. the soul is the piano, with its many strings.”36 similarly, “form itself, even if completely abstract, resembling geometrical form, has its own inner sound.”37 outside of painting, “musical sound has direct access to the soul. it finds there an echo, for man ‘hath music in himself ’.”38 in other words, inner effect is a property of artistic compositions in general, not merely of paintings. it is necessary to note, however, that each discipline of art has its own peculiarities. although one can represent the same inner effect in both painting and music, the two effects can never be the same; “each art has its own forces, which cannot be replaced by those of another art.”39 because an artistic composition is a physical thing, the inner sound is necessarily revealed through some sort of contact with the material of the composition. however, curiously, kandinsky notes that there are kinds of music which “lead us into a new realm, where musical experiences are no longer acoustic, but purely spiritual.”40 kandinsky seems to be saying that, despite the material nature of a composition (in the case of music, acoustic vibrations produced from physical instruments), the spiritual effect can offer itself up directly, as though the material did not exist at all. “the manner of listening to a ‘pure’ musical work is identical to that of seeing a work of ‘concrete’ painting.”41 a work of art is pure when all of its elements are chosen and arranged by necessity. in analyzing kandinsky’s tableau thirty, florman finds a striking similarity between the arrangement of forms in the painting and the composition and function of hegel’s ideal state. she cites frederick beiser’s analysis: first, the whole exists for each of the parts as much as each of the parts exists for the whole; in other words, the individual is as much a means as 34 ibid. 35 kandinsky, on the spiritual in art, p. 163. 36 ibid., p. 160. 37 ibid., p. 163. 38 ibid., p. 161. 39 ibid., p. 155. 40 ibid., p. 155. 41 wassily kandinsky, “abstract and concrete art,” in kandinsky: complete writings on art, ed, kenneth c. lindsay, and peter vergo. (new york: da capo press, 1994), p. 841. 35issue iv f spring 2017 the fructifying ray an end for the state. second … there must be life in each part of the state, so that each has some degree of autonomy and independence. third, each part, in maintaining itself and seeking its own self-interest, also promotes the interest of the whole.42 florman uses this analysis of the state to make sense of thirty’s highly variegated structure, noting that “it’s these independent units, mediating between the kraft or power of the whole and the variety of the particular, often opposed forces pulling the smaller parts in one direction or the other, that give the comparison whatever plausibility it has.”43 the comparison, however, stretches further. kandinsky understands compositions as a general form as “the internally purposive subordination … of the individual elements and … of the structure (construction) to a concrete pictorial goal.”44 thus, while thirty might be the painting through which kandinsky most explicitly states this relationship, kandinsky’s elements-based approach means that the “organic model”45 of hegel’s state applies equally well to all of his proper compositions. this also helps make sense of florman’s other observation: that “in his ideal state, hegel had assigned a crucial role to independent bodies – civic corporations of one kind or another – which were charged with reconciling the conflicting claims of community and freedom.”46 kandinsky believes that within a composition, “independent … complexes can be subordinated to other, still larger, ones which themselves form only part of the overall composition.”47 while the end result of the creative act is a unified composition, the composition nevertheless contains smaller organs within it, which are compositions in their own right. for the comparison to hold, then the elements’ existence must be as dependent on the composition as the composition is on the elements, just as the individual is just as much a means as an end for the state. if an element is to be understood as simply a physical form on the canvas then the comparison falls apart, for the physical form exists outside of its organization into a composition. crucially, however, kandinsky has defined an element as an “encapsulated tension.” the tension is dependent on the hand of the artist, who alienates his consciousness to create that particular element. kojève reaches a similar conclusion in his essay “the concrete paintings of kandinsky,” raising the example of a drawing “in which kandinsky incarnates a beautiful [sic] involving a combination of a triangle with a circle:”48 just as the tableau “represents” nothing external to it, its beautiful is also purely immanent, it is the beautiful of the tableau that exists only in the tableau. this beautiful was created by the artist, just as was the circle42 florman, concerning the spiritual and the concrete in kandinsky’s art (stanford, ca: stanford university press, 2014), p. 64. 43 ibid. 44 kandinsky, point and line to plane, p. 552. 45 florman, concerning the spiritual and the concrete in kandinsky’s art, p. 64. 46 ibid. 47 kandinsky, point and line to plane, p. 616. 48 florman, concerning the spiritual and the concrete in kandinsky’s art, p. 163. 36 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college triangle that embodies it. the circle-triangle does not exist in the real, nonartistic world; it does not exist before, outside of, or apart from the tableau; it was created in and by – or as – the tableau. 49 florman’s comparison to hegel’s ideal state is apt in more ways than she states. the artist’s concrete goal both determines and is determined by the artistic elements which embody it. yet, there is still a gap between the between the work of the creating spirit and the finished composition. the artist has to pass through a triadic stage of creation whereby the artist realizes his or her spiritual value (discernment), morphs it into a form appropriate to an artistic composition (translation), and then create the actual material composition (crafting).50 discernment to begin the process of alienation, the artist must determine what spiritual value is necessary to drive spiritual progress. although the artist has contact with the creating spirit for this purpose, the spiritual value to be materialized does not arrive in a finished form, nor in a way which can be directly cognized. kandinsky suggests that the creative spirit implants the value only as a latent potentiality; it arrives as a longing. it is only later that “if those conditions are fulfilled which are necessary for a precise form to come to maturity, then this longing, this inner compulsion, is empowered to create a new value in the human mind.”51 in other words, the artist does not originally possess the value in its final form. the artist only comes to possess the value through realizing a “precise form,” which empowers the longing.52 as such, to realize what value the artist must embody in his artwork is dependent on contact with the physical world. i call the process by which the artist comes to realize his value discernment. kandinsky himself suggests two conditions through which the precise form can be recognized: the external condition and the internal condition. the internal condition is the power of the human spirit to hear the call of the creating spirit which “impels the human spirit forward and upward.”53 the external condition is the condition whereby “no barriers stand in the way,” of “evolution, progress forward and upward.”54 kandinsky mentions these conditions are necessary to bring a longing to fruition. thus, the implantation of the longing takes place prior to these two conditions. discernment is thus guided by the creative spirit, which is the artist’s own inner impulse, through the two conditions, internal and external, in order to find the 49 ibid. 50 none of these terms exist in kandinsky’s actual texts, nor does he allude to such a triadic process. however, i believe the triadic movement to be the correct reading of his account of the creative act, not a hegelian imposition. 51 kandinsky, “on the question of form,” p. 235. 52 i understand ‘form’ to refer to the material art object which can embody the value. this use of ‘form’ is consistent with both the term as it is generally used in kandinsky’s work as well as within this particular essay. 53 ibid., p. 236. 54 ibid. 37issue iv f spring 2017 the fructifying ray precise form which converts the inner longing into a new value which lives “in a spiritual form within him.”55 what is the event, or events, which causes, or cause, the conversion of a longing into a value? one thing is certain, that the artist must to some degree look outside him or herself to do this. the inner longing is temporally conditioned (hence why it only arises at a particular time), which is to say that the longing is a historical event. the conversion of a longing into a value is done through the discovery of a form. this, too, is historically conditioned, for “form is always temporal, i.e. relative, since it is nothing more than the means necessary today, the means which the revelation of today sounds forth, manifests itself.”56 form itself is subject to both “time (period) and space (nationality).”57 because form is temporally conditioned, the artist does not freely imagine a precise form. the artist can only discover this necessarily temporal form through contact with the temporal world. even the value itself is one which participates in the “continual triumph of new values,”58 which, insofar as they drive the evolution of humanity as a whole, rely on a temporal spectator. in the same way that the hegelian world-historical individual is not simply just a great person, but one who is intensely aware of spirit as it is in the world at the moment, so too is the great artist one who is intensely aware of the spiritual needs of the age. the question still remains, however, the extent to which the artist’s contact with the outside world can be done spiritually, materially, or otherwise. does the artist discover his or her precise form through pure thought, through observing other forms, or through some other means? whatever the case, once the artist has discerned his or her spiritual value, the artist must produce a piece of art to embody that value. to do so, the artist translated that value into a concrete pictorial goal. translation the artist advances the spiritual triangle by disseminating his new value through his artwork. to do so, the artist must translate the spiritual value into a mode which can actually guide the creation of an art object. “from [the] moment,” when the artist realizes the precise form of his value, he “seeks a material form for this new value that lives in a spiritual form within him.”59 translation is the process whereby the artist comes to discover which artistic spiritual effect is capable of materially embodying the spiritual value found through discernment. an artwork embodies the value through possessing a combined spiritual effect which resonates with the spectator in such a way as to inspire that value in the spectator as well. thus, kandinsky says that “every phenomenon in both external and internal worlds can be given linear expression – a kind of translation”60 and also notes the existence of such translations in other art 55 ibid., p. 235. 56 ibid., p. 237. kandinsky’s emphasis. 57 ibid. kandinsky’s emphasis. 58 ibid., p. 236. 59 ibid., p. 235. 60 kandinsky, point and line to plane, pp. 583-584. 38 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college forms such as music as well. the result of the translation, the spiritual effect, we may rightly call the goal of the composition as the artist relates to it. the artist’s aim is to create a composition with the guidance of the translated spiritual value. this agrees with kandinsky’s essay “on stage composition” where he identifies “the goal of a work of art” as “a certain complex of vibrations.”61 the spiritual effect of the composition is not the same thing as the value which it embodies, nor can one proceed directly from a spiritual value to a spiritual effect, which is why translation is a necessary step in the creative process. this is due to the inherent metaphysical properties of artistic compositions in kandinsky’s thought and not merely due to the way the creating spirit acts in the artist. first, the nature of art makes it impossible to translate the goal purely rationally. kandinsky bites the bullet and “abandon[s] the realm of objective reasoning” by stating that “the artist can never either grasp or recognize fully his own goal.”62 this points to the fact that each category of art adds its own peculiarities to the same internal effect and that the internal effect of an element is dependent on the context it is put in. the key to translation is that the artist does not proceed directly from the imagined spiritual value to a fully translated pictorial goal. rather, the artist has to understand the value from the side of the composition. translation imagines what spiritual effect within a composition will inspire the spiritual value in the spectator through internal effect. where each category of art has its own peculiarities in internal effect, the artist can only understand the combined effect through understanding how each kind of art modifies the entire spiritual effect of the composition. thus, a proper examination of the properties of artistic forms is the only way to determine how the artist can perform a translation. in his “cologne lecture,” kandinsky notes his discovery of what florman calls “color’s fundamental mutability.”63 the actual inner sound of a color can be “redefined ad infinitum by its different uses,”64 as opposed to being constant across all paintings. what appears to be a warm color can be made cool in a particular use. this means that the artist cannot reliably use the same color or form to achieve the same spiritual effect repeatedly, as the spiritual effect will change, even drastically so, depending on the other elements of the composition. for translation, this means that the artist has to imagine and/or create a substantial portion of the composition before being able to imagine how each individual form is affected by the others. the inner sound is constantly changing as more elements are added, which is problematic because there is an infinite number of inner sounds, so an element can frequently come to possess an inner sound previously unknown. 61 kandinsky, “on stage composition,” p. 257. 62 kandinsky, “cologne lecture,” p. 399. 63 florman, concerning the spiritual and the concrete in kandinsky’s art, p. 85. 64 kandinsky, “cologne lecture,” p. 398. 39issue iv f spring 2017 the fructifying ray further, “each art has its own forces, which cannot be replaced by those of another art.”65 where do the differences lie? kandinsky notes that “in the last essentials, these means,” the material forms, “are wholly alike: their final goal extinguishes their external dissimilarities and reveals their inner identity.”66 this is not to say that the inner effect of two kinds of art can be identical, for “an exact ‘translation’ of one art to another is impossible.”67 rather the implication is that their identity as spiritually affective art is preserved across category. if the dissimilarity is not due to identity, for they are both spiritually affective art forms at base, and is not due to limitations in inner sound, then the dissimilarity is to be found in the difference in material between categories of art. the affectivity of a certain kind of art owes to the material proper to that kind of art. this means that matter itself has a kind of affectivity peculiar to it. in the process of translation, the artist imagines the concrete pictorial goal in terms of the material they intend to use. but, because the matter is affective in a special way, one which the artist can never fully grasp, the artist cannot immediately determine how the goal is to be translated. thus, “nothing is more damaging and more sinful than to seek one’s forms by force.”68 the artist cannot directly impose himself on the matter because he cannot grasp the translated goal without mediation, hence the sinfulness of forcing forms. however, the artist is capable of perceiving the translated goal in the finished composition even if he is not capable of dictating exactly what it is he perceived. this means the artist can place himself in the presence of the translated goal by the mediation of spiritually affective matter. this is not to say that the artist necessarily approaches the canvas in a state of paralysis, but rather is to say that translation is never complete as a purely mental phenomenon alone. indeed, the impossibility of translation as a purely mental phenomenon points towards the very root of the process of alienation. the goal of a composition, as we have seen, springs forth from the creating spirit, which itself springs forth from the artists’ consciousness. in other words, the goal of the composition is created by, and is held in, the artist’s consciousness. however, as hegel says, the consciousness cannot simply observe itself as it truly is. instead, consciousness must observe itself through alienation by recognizing itself in an external object. in this case, the creative act is the work which invests consciousness in an external object, the composition, and allows the artist to recognize himself. hence, the artist cannot simply immediately realize his translated goal, as to do so would be to observe consciousness directly. rather, the artist must first begin crafting his composition. 65 kandinsky, on the spiritual in art, p. 155. 66 kandinsky, “on stage composition,” p. 257. 67 kandinsky, “abstract and concrete art,” p. 841. 68 kandinsky, “cologne lecture,” p. 396. 40 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college crafting creation is the actual physical process by which the artist creates the art object which will materialize the spiritual value by embodying the value’s translation into artistic spiritual effect. in crafting, the goal serves to guide which forms must be placed by inner necessity. crafting includes things such as painting, sculpting, writing, or any such physical activity. as with translation and discernment, crafting is a necessary step in the creative process, especially insofar as the result of crafting, the composition, is what mediates the spiritual value back into the spiritual triangle. an artist creates a composition by combining the elements proper to the type of art they are working in as guided by the goal they wish to create. for example, graphic art features the point and the line. kandinsky does not speak much about the actual physical process of crafting. indeed, to speak too much of it would risk a descension into “virtuoso painting,”69 or painting that focuses on external effect rather than internal effect. however, he does mention that form must “enter into the work of art of its own accord, and, moreover, at that level of completeness which corresponds to the development of the creative spirit.”70 the physical “matter is here a reserve of supplies from which the spirit, like a cook, selects what is necessary in this case.”71 there are many different ways to produce forms just as there are many different categories of art. point and line to plane makes a particular study of etching, woodcutting, and lithography to demonstrate how different technical methods can impact the inner sound of certain elements. each of these three crafting techniques gives a point “various faces and hence various expressions.”72 as a grouping, “technical resources arise no less intentionally and purposively than all other phenomena, both in the “material” world (spruce, lion, star, louse) and in the “spiritual” (work of art, moral principle, scientific method, religious idea).”73 as the artist gazes at the forms he has created, he becomes a spectator to his own work. the artist’s own composition as it is being crafted inspires a spiritual effect in the artist himself. this can help the artist further realize his own spiritual value or realize exactly how it is that value translates into a concrete pictorial goal. collapse of the triad the separation of the creative act into each of these three stages contains within it a problem. each of the three stages requires something outside of itself to reach completeness, indeed even to begin in the first place. discernment requires recognition of a precise form for the spiritual value to make itself apparent. if the 69 kandinsky, “on the artist,” p. 412. 70 kandinsky, “cologne lecture,” p. 396. 71 kandinsky, “on the question of form,” p. 235. 72 kandinsky, point and line to plane, p. 566. 73 ibid., p. 563. 41issue iv f spring 2017 the fructifying ray precise form is to be appropriate for the spiritual value, then the value must already be conceived of as a translated value. however, translation requires contact with the material of the composition because the inner sound of the elements is unknowable in isolation. because the artist cannot fully imagine the inner sound of each element without viewing the element’s inner sound in juxtaposition with other sounds, the artist cannot perfectly picture a complete canvas in his head before the piece has been created. translation is thus only approximate at best until the artist sees how the inner sounds of familiar elements are modified by their juxtapositions. likewise, crafting requires a concrete pictorial goal to choose and order the elements. the artist must choose elements in accordance with the translated goal, which is itself dependent on the artist’s discernment of the spiritual value, which is itself dependent on realizing the precise form of the composition. the artistic process seems to be at a standstill. each stage requires something from the other stage in order to proceed. hegel himself recognizes a similar problem in the phenomenology of spirit in chapter 5, c “individuality which takes itself to be real in and for itself ”: consciousness must act merely in order that what it is in itself may become explicit for it; in other words, action is simply the coming-to-be of spirit as consciousness. what the latter is in itself, it knows therefore from what it actually is. accordingly, an individual cannot know what he [really] is until he has made himself a reality through action. however, this seems to imply that he cannot determine the end of his action until he has carried it out; but at the same time, since he is a conscious individual, he must have the action in front of him beforehand as entirely his own, i.e. as an end. the individual who is going to act seems, therefore, to find himself in a circle in which each moment already presupposes the other, and thus he seems unable to find a beginning, because he only gets to know his original nature, which must be his end, from the deed, while, in order to act, he must have that end beforehand. but for that very reason he has to start immediately, and, whatever the circumstances, without further scruples about beginning, means, or end, proceed to action; for his essence and intrinsic nature is beginning, means, and end, all in one. 74 the “end” here is analogous to the artist’s concrete pictorial goal and the deadlock is much the same. how can the artist proceed, oriented towards the concrete pictorial goal, that is, his end, when that end is only found through the action? if the end must be had beforehand, it seems impossible to proceed. however, where the end springs forth from consciousness itself, the deadlock can be broken. because the artist alienates his own consciousness as the concrete pictorial goal, the intrinsic nature of that very consciousness contains the beginning, means, and end within it already. it is immediate action which leads to the end of the creative act. 74 hegel, g.w.f., phenomenology of spirit, trans. a. v. miller, (oxford university press, 1977), p. 240. 42 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college florman, while having a different account for the creative act, nonetheless arrives at a similar conclusion. through her analysis, florman has also identified a triadic creative process. in the first moment the artist lays in the main body of the composition, in the second moment he balances the individual elements against one another, and in the third the artist makes tiny alterations in color to profoundly alter the combined effect.75 florman notes that “the implication here is that the painting’s completion turned on a process not wholly, not even primarily, within the artist’s conscious control. especially at this third stage, kandinsky would have us know, progress was driven by painting’s own logic or ‘inner necessity.’”76 florman’s description picks up after implantation of the inner longing,77 but nevertheless demonstrates something profound about kandinsky’s account of the creative process in agreement with hegel: that true distinctions between moments of the creative process are ultimately untenable. even if the artist lays out the main forms first, the forms are not the same in essence as the final forms. as was said above,78 the elements and goal are mutually constitutive. if the goal changes after the main forms are laid in, then those forms change as well. it is in this same way that discernment, translation, and crafting collapse into one another. conclusion at the end of the creative act, the artist’s externalized consciousness lies ready to re-confront itself in the completed composition. the triadic movement described above ultimately sunders into the more general process of alienation. now latent in the composition is consciousness as implanted through a concrete pictorial goal in the creative act. in order to drive spiritual progress, the composition now offers itself up to the spectator; for, after all, the artist exists “exclusively for the sake of the spectator, because the artist is the slave of humanity.”79 the spiritual bread offered in the composition is a spiritual value created by the artist’s own inner impulse under the guise of the creating spirit. truly, then, the artist offers his own consciousness up as the people’s spiritual bread. in doing so, “in rendering itself objective and making this [–] its being [–] an object of thought, [spirit,] on the one hand, destroys the determinate form of its being, and, on the other hand, gains a comprehension of the universal element which it involves and, thereby, gives a new form to its inherent principle … [which] has risen into another, and, in fact, a higher principle.” the higher principle is still shrouded in mystery for kandinsky, but he nevertheless maintains conviction that the spiritual triangle moves ever upward. it is only through hegel’s theory of alienation, however, that the movement of the triangle is given its fullest expression, for in it we see that the creative act is itself the movement of consciousness from the triangle into the composition through the artist’s hand. f 75 florman, concerning the spiritual and the concrete in kandinsky’s art, p. 85. 76 ibid. 77 see discernment 78 see composition 79 kandinsky, “on the artist,” p. 418. 43issue iv f spring 2017 the fructifying ray bibliography florman, lisa carol. concerning the spiritual and the concrete in kandinsky’s art. stanford, ca: stanford university press, 2014. hegel, g.w.f. aesthetics: lectures on fine art. translated by t. m. knox, oxford: clarendon press, 1975. ——— lectures on the philosophy of history. translated by john sibree. new york: henry g. bohn, 1861. ——— phenomenology of spirit. translated by. a. v. miller. oxford university press, 1977. ——— the philosophy of history. ontario: batoche books, 1900. https://www. marxists.org/reference/archive/hegel/works/hi/introduction-lectures.htm#s1. kandinsky, wassily. “abstract and concrete art.” kandinsky: complete writings on art, kenneth c. lindsay and peter vergo, eds. p. 840. new york: da capo press, 1994. ——— “cologne lecture.” kandinsky: complete writings on art, kenneth c. lindsay and peter vergo, eds. pp. 392-400. new york: da capo press, 1994. ——— “on the spiritual in art.” kandinsky: complete writings on art, kenneth c. lindsay, and peter vergo, eds. pp. 114-219. new york: da capo press, 1994. ——— “on stage composition” kandinsky: complete writings on art, kenneth c. lindsay and peter vergo, eds. pp. 257-264. new york: da capo press, 1994. ——— “on the artist.” kandinsky: complete writings on art, kenneth c. lindsay, and peter vergo, eds. pp. 407-418. new york: da capo press, 1994. ——— “point and line to plane.” kandinsky: complete writings on art, kenneth c. lindsay, and peter vergo, eds. pp. 524-699. new york: da capo press, 1994. klee, paul. on modern art. translated by paul findlay. london: faber and faber, 1966. hegel, g.w.f. hegel’s logic. translated by william wallace. london: oxford university press, 1975. pippin, robert b. after the beautiful: hegel and the philosophy of pictorial modernism. chicago: the university of chicago press, 2014. rae, gavin. “hegel, alienation, and the phenomenological development of consciousness.” international journal of philosophical studies 2012. 20.1 pp. 23-42 sayers, sean. “creative activity and alienation in hegel and marx.” historical materialism 2003. 11.1 pp. 107-28. 6 δι αν οι α looks, gestures, and words: skepticism and the ethical in cavell and levinas bernardo portilho andrade we know nothing of the soul other than of our own; those of others are looks, are gestures, are words, and what we assume of resemblance at the bottom. – fernando pessoa1 a sense of separation from others often comes to the overly conscious student who has just ended a conversation with his much-esteemed professor: “what did he think of what i said?” from there arises an obsessive wish for a third-party witness, as if in the form of a minuscule fly or a hidden camera, allowing him to revisit later the conversation with his interlocutor: “if only i could remember exactly what happened, as if replaying a clip, i would be able to distinguish my subjective projections from the objective interaction!” however, even that turns out to be a futile wish, as the despairing student realizes that no objective recording could reveal the depths of his listener’s inner states. the professor’s outward expressions might be wholly distinct from his impressions, and nothing could grant the student such privileged access – for unless each lives for a moment in the other’s mind, they will stay forever separate, 1 i am quoting my own translation of pessoa’s untitled poem. as far as i know, no english version has been published. for the original portuguese, see: pessoa, fernando. poesias inéditas (1930-1935). lisboa: edições atica, 1955. 7issue iv f spring 2017 looks, gestures, and words forever isolated. the problem described above – namely that my knowledge cannot seize hold of the other person and possess him; that i cannot enter into his eyes and grasp the inner workings of his soul – lies at the core of what stanley cavell and emmanuel levinas would call the “scandal of skepticism.” this brings up a surprising coincidence, i.e. that an american philosopher (with intellectual roots in the works of emerson, thoreau, austin and wittgenstein) and a french-lithuanian thinker (whose inspiration comes from the jewish tradition and the phenomenology of husserl and heidegger) arrive at an uncannily similar solution to a problem perceived within two separate historical dialogues. this paper attempts to locate and explain this point of agreement. in doing so, it presents the profoundly innovative view of morality that arises from both authors’ reflections on skepticism. this enquiry departs from cavell’s late collection of essays philosophy the day after tomorrow. in the book’s sixth chapter, entitled “what is the scandal of skepticism,” cavell admits his surprise when reading levinas, in particular his astonishment at the eerie similarity between their solutions to other-mind skepticism.2 encouraged by cavell’s essay, i intend 1), to elucidate his notion of the “scandal of skepticism” and 2), to provide a short comparison between cavell and levinas’ solutions to that scandal. i will conclude that their respective analyses of skepticism both lead to the radical statement, attributed to levinas, that “ethics is first philosophy.” 1. cavell and the “scandal of skepticism” cavell borrows his title, “the scandal of skepticism,” from kant’s footnote in his preface to the second edition of the critique of pure reason. as kant says: “it always remains a scandal of philosophy and universal human reason that the existence of things outside us… should have to be assumed merely on faith, and that if it occurs to anyone to doubt it, we should be unable to answer him with a satisfactory proof.”3 what kant finds scandalous is that the philosophy of his time still has not found a proof of the existence of external things. he opposes the claim that one can be conscious only of what is in him, i.e., his representation of external things, and that he thus cannot know whether or not there is something outside him, corresponding to it.4 kant is hence concerned with skepticism 1), as a function of knowledge (can we know anything?), and specifically 2), of knowledge of the external world. 2 cavell, philosophy the day after tomorrow, p. 150. cavell’s feeling of surprise came after reading levinas’ collection of essays entitled difficult freedom, which cavell quotes at length in the sixth chapter of his book. 3 kant, immanuel, preface to the second edition, critique of pure reason, b xl. for the specific translation referenced here, see kant, immanuel, paul guyer, and allen w. wood, critique of pure reason. 4 berkeley presents this anti-kantian position in his three dialogues, when philonous says, “it is a great contradiction to talk of conceiving a thing which is unconceived… you cannot possibly conceive how any corporeal sensible thing should exist otherwise than in a mind.” see berkeley, three dialogues between hylas and philonous, pp. 35-36. 8 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college kant’s quotation also reflects his response to humean skepticism. the passage works as a critique of hume, who abandons his philosophical project after affirming that we rely on a natural belief in the external world and in its causal laws. the humean notion that the mind has a habit (not a reason) that leads to beliefs about the external world explains why kant uses the word “faith” when he states that it is a scandal of philosophy “that we should have to accept the existence of things outside us […] merely on faith.”5 kant thus finds it inacceptable that hume, as well as all thinkers before him, has not philosophically solved the problem of external-world skepticism. cavell, however, takes the “scandal of skepticism” in a different way. following wittgenstein, he embeds philosophy in ordinary language – a profound methodological shift that, as i will show, finally leads to the priority of the ethical. unlike kant, cavell is not concerned with skepticism as a threat to a systematic science that studies the external world. rather, he finds that skepticism is inherent in (ordinary) language because of the attunement of the speakers. he worries about the difficulties of communication; about the seeming impossibility of knowing whether the other person means the same as i do by the words we use. science avoids skepticism by sublimating language in fixed rules of procedure and agreement, but our everyday use of words “is anything but invulnerable to skepticism.”6 cavell wonders why philosophers so often have hubristic ambitions to go beyond the ordinary. after all, descartes’ meditations starts with an isolated philosopher fleeing from the ordinary, trapping himself in a tiny room with some candlewax and not much else. hume similarly takes the problem of skepticism to be divorced from ordinary life. to escape his philosophical melancholy, he dines, plays a game of backgammon, and has merry conversations with friends. this attitude certainly resonates with hume’s maxim: “be a philosopher, but be still a man.”7 the concerns that trouble the philosopher seem, for hume, not to reach man in his concrete life. that is why philosophy, throughout its history, “has chronically required of itself a flight from the ordinary.”8 the thinker, in his search for knowledge and certainty, has far too often decided to escape everyday life as a means of finding theoretical grounding. however, to deal with skepticism solely in the abstract realm of ontology leaves unexplored the persistent danger of skepticism in our everyday use of language. for cavell, that is the scandal. 1.1.cavellian skepticism and wittgensteinian criteria cavell’s ordinary-language skepticism rests on what wittgenstein calls criteria. unlike other interpreters of wittgenstein, cavell does not see the philosophical investigation 5 kant, preface to the second edition, critique of pure reason, and b xl. 6 cavell, philosophy the day after tomorrow, p. 134. 7 hume, an enquiry concerning human understanding, “section 1: of the different species of philosophy.” 8 cavell, philosophy the day after tomorrow, p. 134 9issue iv f spring 2017 looks, gestures, and words as an attempt to refute skepticism; on the contrary, he takes wittgenstein to show that skepticism is an inevitable by-product of ordinary language. in the usual view, criteria are presumed to rebut skepticism by establishing the existence of something with certainty.9 for example, against the skeptic who doubts that he can ever know with certainty whether or not the other is in pain,10 the philosopher can point to the criteria of pain (say, contorting one’s face), the presence of which necessarily entails that the other is in pain. john austin embodies this approach in his famous example of the goldfinch.11 if one were to disagree with austin as to whether the bird they see is a goldfinch, austin would simply refer him to the rulebook (in this case, to a book on birdwatching), and then tell him that since the bird they see has that black stripe in his wing, and that yellow throat, it must be a goldfinch. in other words, these are the criteria that establish what it means to be a goldfinch. to disagree with austin would entail that one does not know what a goldfinch is; what its criteria are. for cavell, on the other hand, criteria cannot settle the skeptic’s worries. far from dismissing skepticism, a correct understanding of criteria shows skepticism to be irrefutable. criteria belong solely to the way we agree within language, and not to any context-less and independently existing rulebook. no rulebook could ever account for the flexibility and creativity with which i employ my concepts, establish commitments, and make myself responsible. nothing underlies or “governs” my application of concepts in judgments. surprisingly, both cavell and levinas share this particular and highly innovative view on language. although i am stepping ahead, this point of agreement becomes clear when levinas says, in his collection of essays entitled humanism of the other, that: language refers to the positions of the listener and the speaker, that is, to the contingency of their story. to seize by inventory all the contexts of language and all possible positions of interlocutors is a senseless task. every verbal signification lies at the confluence of countless semantic rivers.12 the skeptic wishes to obtain the certainty that his application of concepts is based on something robust, solid, or fixed – a structure, a manual, an impersonal metaphysics. some commentators on cavell and wittgenstein (such as stephen mulhall and saul kripke), in line with the skeptical demand for a solid foundation, often emphasize the idea of language as an agreed-upon framework of rules, which relieves the speakers of responsibility for their own words, freezing or sublimating language, emptying it of its on-going flexibility and creativity.13 to such ordinary-language philosophers, 9 hammer, stanley cavell: skepticism, subjectivity and the ordinary, p. 32. 10 whether physical or emotional, i take pain to be an unpleasant private experience. the significance of the pain example, which will appear multiple times henceforth, is that most people take pain to be private to their owner in the strong sense that no one else can epistemically access the other’s pain in the way that one has access to his own pain. 11 austin gives the goldfinch example, among other places, in a 1946 essay entitled “other minds.” see austin, james urmson, and geoffrey warnock, philosophical papers, pp. 76-116. 12 levinas, humanism of the other, p. 11. 13 hammer, stanley cavell: skepticism, subjectivity and the ordinary, p. 39. 10 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college once the criteria for pain are satisfied (say, your face is contorted) the question of the non-existence of pain can be discarded. what more, they might ask, could one possibly require? this misses the point, however, that in cases of acting or feigning, it is precisely pain-behavior, and hence the satisfaction of the criteria of pain, that is being simulated. without the possibility of simulating the satisfaction of criteria, acting or feigning would not exist. this shows that we are never in a position to know with absolute certainty that the other feels pain. the skeptic would like criteria to prove that someone really is in pain, but criteria give us certainty about identity, not existence.14 this already points to the fragility of our everyday use of words, to how language skeptically invites us to demand certainty of the other’s pain: i want to act correctly, to show concern only when you really feel pain. however, all i have are your looks, your gestures and your words, and they do not suffice as criteria for existence. when it comes to my criteria regarding the other person, it seems that i am always acting on the basis of insufficient evidence. after all, i must respond to the other’s pain, to his smile or affection, and yet my criteria can never provide me with certainty of the existence of his inner states, only of its semblance: “he is expressing pain, or expressing care… but does he feel it?” a fundamental lack of knowledge permeates all of my relationships with others, and from this abyss comes my skeptical wish to fill the darkness with certainty of the other’s inner states. ordinary-language skepticism thus comes from the realization of this inevitable epistemological separation between me and the other person: “how am i supposed to respond to him, to acknowledge his pain, if i cannot know for sure that he is suffering?” to refrain from doing good is not morally neutral; to flee from the world and avoid the other already has its moral charge. such is the reason why this cavellian skepticism stands as primarily ethical: the ethical trauma results from the fact that my epistemological possibilities reach up to a certain point, whereas my moral obligations extend beyond that point. for instance, i cannot know with certainty that the other is truly sad, but i must respond – here and now – to his crestfallen look. the skeptic, troubled by cavell’s reading of wittgenstein’s criteria, thus presents a reasonable request – namely, to act out of knowledge and not out of ignorance; to have his moral actions be determined by the extent of his knowledge. such has, after all, been the standard approach in the history of western philosophy. ever since plato’s protagoras, philosophers have always taken good and virtuous actions at least to involve knowledge, not simply to be equated to knowledge. socrates, for instance, claims that knowledge alone generates all virtues, whereas ignorance alone causes all vices.15 as descartes similarly says in the meditations: “from a great light in the understanding results a great propensity in the will.”16 our will, the mover of our actions, must follow and obey the understanding. to demand otherwise, to request 14 ibid., p. 41. 15 see plato’s protagoras, 357b-e 16 see descartes, meditationes de prima philosophia, meditation iv, §69. i am quoting my own english translation. 11issue iv f spring 2017 looks, gestures, and words that our moral actions precede understanding, stands as a highly radical position. far from being easily dismissible, the skeptic in fact embodies the spirit of western philosophy when he reacts against cavell’s reading of criteria. in order to justify cavell’s radical position – placing morality before knowledge and certainty, and thus opposing the general historical trend of western philosophy – i will in the next few paragraphs further expose the ethical trauma of attempting to establish criteria regarding the other on the basis of insufficient evidence. such is the trauma of trying to have certainty of the other’s inner states as an epistemological basis for the ethical. if i show this (skeptical) approach as inherently frustrated, as an attempt for the impossible, as a recipe for disaster, then i will be able to justify cavell’s ethical response to the skeptic – namely, the primacy of ethics over certainty, or stated differently, the urgency of acknowledging the other prior to (and independently of ) knowing that other. at first sight, the word ‘acknowledgment’ seems to contain within it the word ‘knowledge,’ but, interestingly enough, the only way to leave our other-mind skepticism behind is to learn how to acknowledge the other without knowing the other with certainty. 1.2. the ethical trauma of cavellian skepticism if criteria grant me certainty only of the identity of something and not of its existence, as i have already shown, both external-world and other-mind skepticism become possible. for just as cavell considers how disappointment with criteria pervades philosophy’s quest for certainty about the existence of the external world, so does he take the problem of other minds to result from the wish to strip ourselves of the responsibilities and anxieties that mark our usage of criteria. i find it difficult both to know 1), whether the objects which i see as fulfilling the criteria for cars in fact exist and 2), whether the gestures which i see as fulfilling the criteria for sadness a), indeed exist and b), correspond to a real state of inner-sadness. external-world skepticism might lead to other-mind skepticism, but as we can see from the double layer of complexity in the latter case (2), it is other-mind skepticism which presents a greater problem. to be sure, cavell thinks that both forms of skepticism cannot be easily dismissed, but he clearly devotes more time to solving the difficulties around other-mind skepticism. if the objects around me fulfill the criteria for cars, i can very well assume the existence of those cars without any satisfactory proof, for otherwise i run the mortal risk of a traffic accident. but to assume facts about the other person – that is, to make claims about the other person and to act on those claims – can lead me to moral disaster. i can, of course, simply assume the overall existence of the other person without moral consequences (most people do), just as i did in the case of the cars. however, notice that i can also easily assume (without any moral consequence) that inside the car, i will find five seats or a big trunk, whereas i cannot assume (without moral 12 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college consequences) that the other loves me, cares for me, or has any interest in listening to my stories. suppose that i want to settle the question and not just assume that the car has five seats: i could open its doors and look inside. imagine that what i see inside the car does fulfill the criteria for five seats. being a skeptic, i can of course doubt whether i am really seeing five seats (whether they really exist), but i am nonetheless directly witnessing those five seats; that is, they are still present to me as objects to my knowledge. i can certainly doubt the powers of my own witnessing, but that is as far as i can go. the situation concerning the other person, however, seems very different. in the latter case, i cannot directly witness the other’s inner states: i cannot feel your love for me, or your interest in my stories. i can still see your facial expressions, just as i can listen to your words of praise, but that alone is what i am directly witnessing. if i were to doubt my senses, as in the case of looking inside the car, i would analogously doubt whether i am correctly perceiving those facial expressions and those words of praise. if i were to doubt the other just as i did in the case of the car, i would doubt whether what i see indeed fulfills the criteria for, say, a smile. but my skepticism towards the other can always go further: “is he faking? is he merely pretending to like me? and with what intention?” this worry rests on the impossibility of my knowing whether you are enjoying my company or the food i cooked, and not on the impossibility of my knowing whether you are smiling at me, nodding your head, or holding my hand. thus, my doubt regarding the other has two layers: a), the perception of his gestures and b), the correspondence of those gestures to his inner states. whereby i suffer no moral consequences for suspending my worries regarding the inside of the car, i run the risk of deception, of betrayal, and of eventually ending up alone if i suspend my skeptical worries of the other’s feelings. in the previous paragraph, i advanced the notion that skeptical worries about the other stand as a persistent possibility in ordinary language and everyday life. however, while cavell recognizes the moral risks in completely suspending these worries (such as the risk of betrayal or deception), he particularly focuses on the danger of not suspending skeptical worries; that is, of demanding certainty of the other’s inner states. the wish to possess the other, so to speak, and to grasp him as an object of knowledge – which reminds us of our introductory paragraph – is both the wish for the impossible and the birth of a tragic fate. i intend to elucidate both of these notions in the two following subsections. the first, dealing with the impossibility of knowing the other’s inner states, bases itself on cavell’s essay “knowing and acknowledging,” from must we mean what we say; the second, touching on the tragic fate of the skeptic, finds its roots in cavell’s reading of king lear in “the avoidance of love,” also in the same book. 13issue iv f spring 2017 looks, gestures, and words 1.2.1. skepticism as the wish for the impossible my separation from others lies in the fact that, however intimate i am with some people, i am still myself and not them, and i can never truly be in their position; i can never have their feelings and thoughts, for otherwise they would be mine and not theirs. such a separation does not describe an inability of mine, or a mistake to be corrected, but rather a general fact of the human condition. though i can nominally have the same pain as you (e.g. accidentally hitting my thumb with a hammer as i build a treehouse), i have no means of accessing how it feels to you. i know how the pain feels to me, and i know what i call it, but that name might correspond to a completely different feeling for you. in other words, it stands as a permanent possibility that the hammer could have caused a wholly distinct pain in your finger, and my inability to have your pain stops me from either confirming or denying it. with regards to my pain, “i stand sealed out from others, as well as sealed in myself.”17 in discussing the skeptical problem of “having” the other’s pain,18 cavell defends wittgenstein’s interlocutor in the philosophical investigations, where the author says that it makes no sense to want to have the other’s pain. cavell states that the skeptic of the investigations has discovered that unless he can share or swap feelings with the other person, he cannot know what the other is experiencing (if anything).19 though cavell does not think this is a perfectly unobjectionable idea, he is far from confident that he knows what is objectionable about it. to be sure, it may turn out that the question “can i have the same feeling that he does?” is badly conceived, but the point of the matter, for cavell, lies in the fact that this has not been shown in the investigations.20 in order to show that the skeptic’s question cannot be easily dismissed, cavell mentions the example of a couple owning two cars of the same model (both are 1952 mg-td’s). to say that the cars are the same is to say that they are not different makes, but it cannot be denied that the husband has his car and the wife hers – that there are two.21 however, when it comes to colors, if the color of this notebook fits the same description as the color of that notebook (let us say, #250 of the universal color chips) then the color of the notebooks is the same. and if a critic were to ask: “but are there not two colors, just as in the case of the cars?”, cavell would respond that unless the critic means that one of them seems closer to #249 or to #251, he does not know what “color” or “same” means, what a color is.22 we then conclude that with pains, as with cars – but not with colors – we can say that in one sense there are two (in terms of its “numeric identity”) and in another sense there is only one (in terms of its “qualitative identity”). the whole issue of concern for the skeptic, however, 17 cavell, must we mean what we say, p. 240. 18 wittgenstein, philosophical investigations, § 293. 19 cavell, must we mean what we say, p. 228. 20 ibid. 21 cavell, must we mean what we say, p. 224. 22 ibid. 14 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college lies precisely in the lack (or impossibility) of numeric identity, because in the case of pain that stands as a complete impediment to knowledge. suppose the couple can have descriptively the same pain – say, again, hitting their fingers with a hammer while building the family’s tree house: do they have the same particular pain? can we know here and now that they do? it is as if we needed to feel a replica of their pains – first of the husband, then of the wife – in order to compare and confirm that it is the same. as cavell states: “if this is the way things are, we do not know whether they have the same pain or not; we never can.” 23 the fact that the last paragraph ends with the words “we never can [know]” already shows why cavell calls this form of skepticism a wish for the impossible. we demand knowledge precisely of what we cannot know; we want certainty with regards to the other’s inner states, which requires the abolition of numeric differences. if only we were all one single extended body with one single extended mind, without alterity, we would be able to acquire certainty of all inner states. 24one can already notice the violent nature of such a wish, the thirsting for totality or for the dissolution of the other. though i keep telling myself not to jump ahead, a reader of levinas can see the incredible similarity between the two thinkers unfolding at this point. the skeptic of the investigations – who, after all, is not unreasonable – whose claim is not easily dismissible or objectionable – has a wish for totality, a desire to encompass everything into sameness, into a sine fine self.25 but that is impossible: the other’s pain is not present to me as an object of knowledge. i am inevitably confined to knowing only of the other’s expressions and outward manifestations. with regards to his pain, i cannot know it, but simply accept it (to respond to his contorted face with care) or deny it (to turn away my eyes, looking out the window). 1.2.2. skepticism begets a tragic fate cavell claims that tragedy (at least in its shakespearean form) displays the structure of other-mind skepticism, a disappointment with the human finitude of criteria and the consequent denial of the “unknowable” other. in the final pages of the claim of reason, cavell establishes that skepticism is intrinsically marked by its drive towards the tragic. incapable of coming to terms with the limits of criteria, the skeptic tragically finds himself, the world, and others to be withdrawn from each other and devoid of significance.26 such is the reason, as we shall see, why king lear demands 23 cavell, must we mean what we say, p. 229. 24 what i have described in this sentence is an even more radical example than the one given by cavell on p. 232 of must we mean what we say. cavell talks about two corsican brothers, one of whom (call him second), suffers everything which happens to his brother (call him first). when you whip first, second writhes with him – not in sympathy, seeing what is happening, but even miles away, not knowing what is happening to his brother. this is a way for cavell to conceive of a situation in which both individuals have numerically the same pain. but as cavell points out, it is not clear whether second will express his pain by saying “i am in pain” or “he (first) is in pain.” in this case, problems still arise concerning our knowledge of the other because alterity, separation and individuation are still in place. the skeptic wishes, in a way, for the abolition of individuation, which he cannot achieve. 25 the skeptical wish for the abolition of numeric differences and of otherness is the wish for a self “without end,” echoing the latin expression “imperium sine fine,” “the empire without end,” which refers to rome. 26 hammer, stanley cavell: skepticism, subjectivity, and the ordinary, p. 77. 15issue iv f spring 2017 looks, gestures, and words of his daughters, so to speak, a certificate of love. lear wants a statement of love that fixates, grounds and establishes that which can only exist in in the fragile and toohuman realm of ordinary language. a disappointment with the limits of criteria and the consequent denial of the other mark cavell’s reading of king lear in his essay entitled “the avoidance of love.” as the title suggests, avoidance permeates the whole play: gloucester refuses to recognize edmund as his illegitimate son; cornwall blinds gloucester so as not to be seen by him; lear does not reveal himself to gloucester after the latter’s blinding; and most importantly, lear denies his love for cordelia in the abdication scene in act i. what cavell finds interesting in this fateful scene from act i is that, while desperately wanting cordelia’s love, lear sees the demand that her love makes upon him as threatening. the realization that love involves dependence strikes lear as incompatible with his position of power and authority as king. threatened by the fear of exposing these feelings (and thus by the fear of the dependence that these feelings entail), lear arranges for his daughters to publicly declare their love for him, and in return he agrees to distribute his lands to each of them. lear thus asks his daughters to make him look like a loved father, but without having to return in kind. cordelia, however, who loves her father, cannot accept this. rather than giving a lofty and elevated speech of praise, offering false love in return for lear’s rewards, she chooses to remain silent. only by refusing the dissimulated expression of love that lear expects of her – that is, by keeping her love secret – can cordelia continue to be responsive to her own true feelings.27 lear’s subsequent fury and ruthlessness comes not from his doubts as to whether cordelia really loves him, but rather from his having to accept their mutual love and dependence on one another, which requires that he reveals himself to cordelia. by failing to expose his dependence, lear rejects both the one he loves and her love for him.28 in other words, by wanting to possess cordelia’s love as one possesses a material object (owning it while not being owned by it) lear ends up losing what he already had: a loving relationship. this interpretation touches on a fundamental aspect of acknowledgment according to cavell – namely, that acknowledging entails revealing oneself to the other, making oneself known, handing oneself over to the other to be either accepted or rejected. to acknowledge cordelia’s love lear must reveal himself as desiring that love, as loving her back, as being weakened by love and thus vulnerable to his beloved. cavell’s ethical response to skepticism thus arises as one of revealing oneself to the other, of being determined by that other, which is the very opposite of self-determination. lear’s failure to acknowledge leads to tragedy, for after banishing cordelia from his kingdom, lear must now reveal not only his feelings towards her, but he must also recognize that he has distorted their relationship. as cavell puts it, lear must reveal 27 hammer, stanley cavell: skepticism, subjectivity and the ordinary, p. 79. 28 ibid. 16 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college “that he is her unjust banishing father.”29 it is out of his failure to reveal himself as her unjust father that cordelia dies, which cavell takes to mean that “every falsehood, every refusal of acknowledgment, will be tracked down. in the realm of spirit… there is absolute justice.”30 lear knows that his frustration does not in fact come from uncertainty as to whether cordelia loves him or not. instead, he is incapable of coming to terms with his human condition – with the fact that he loves her, and is thus dependent on a finite and fragile being, so finite and so fragile as to die in his hands by the end of the play. but in the fashion of a good skeptic, lear converts this human condition into a riddle, into an intellectual lack: “can i know that she loves me?” and yet, as i have said in the previous sections, the inner states of the other human being are not up to proof; they exist beyond the scope of scientific evidence, of ocular testimony, of certificates and contracts. behind the skeptic’s demanding rationality, therefore, stands an unbearable fear of disappointment with the other’s too-human finitude, which gets converted into an impossible intellectual demand. in our narcissism, we wish to be grand, which means hiding from the finite other, for to acknowledge him entails joining his kind. shakespearean theatre thus shows us that theatricality must be defeated. 2. levinas, cavell and the primacy of the ethical i have so far exposed cavell’s views on the ethical danger of ordinary-language skepticism, that is, the danger of reducing the other person to a philosophical puzzle or an intellectual lack. this attitude becomes one of domination or possession, for the skeptic wishes to contain the other within the limits of his knowledge. lear wants, as was said, a certificate of love from cordelia, so that all of cordelia’s being is in there, and nothing is outside; cordelia would then become completely known, thoroughly revealed, like an aircraft to a boeing engineer. the skeptic’s tragic fate comes from placing epistemology first and ethics second, that is, from wanting to know before acknowledging. it is at this point that we find the unexpected similarity between cavell and levinas. both philosophers converge on the levinasian maxim that “ethics is first philosophy.” cavell criticizes ordinary-language philosophers for wanting criteria to cover the full depths of the other person’s being. levinas, in his turn, similarly attacks phenomenology – the philosophical tradition he has inherited from husserl and heidegger – for reducing the other to a term within language, to a phenomenon within the world of consciousness. in the following part of my essay, i will first introduce levinas’ critique of phenomenology, and then compare the two thinkers. such a comparison is as tempting as it is unexplored. despite having mentioned his surprise with levinas late in his career, cavell has not himself devoted the time to 29 cavell, the claim of reason, p. 429. 30 cavell, must we mean what we say, p. 309. 17issue iv f spring 2017 looks, gestures, and words studying levinas extensively. what follows is, i believe, much needed – and just as with anything done for the first time, it might require successive attempts. 2.1. a sketch of levinasian phenomenology phenomenology is the descriptive study of what appears, of what is being (re-)presented to consciousness. however, to appear as phenomena, beings must be identified as this or that (i see this as a chair). in the absence of any identification, there would only be a rustling of a totally anonymous and shapeless “there is” (il y a) in which everything gets confused with everything else. the identity of a phenomenon as this or that is its thematization: “being manifests itself by becoming a theme,”31 that is, by being gathered, centered and posited as this or that. levinas emphasizes the lack of a pure receptivity in the way that consciousness “takes” or posits something as something else. the commentator adriaan peperzak says that “there is a sort of sovereignty in this way of getting in touch with the given. consciousness leads the game and determines the positions of the pawns.”32 the logos overcomes the pre-phenomenal chaos and establishes an order in the anonymous rustling of being. every phenomenon thus becomes a said (un dit); that is, the thematic presentation of a being, the gathering of an identification that consciousness imposes on the “there is” (il y a). according to levinas, the whole history of western philosophy has been dominated by the idea that beings and being show themselves when expressed in speech or writing, when put in the said. levinas, however, criticizes the entire tradition by pointing to a simple fact: a discourse is always said by someone to one or more others (or to oneself as listener or reader).33 the saying of a said (le dire d’un dit) stands as one of the most ordinary and basic events of everyday life, as well as the root of the whole enterprise of civilization, unfolding itself in communication and social institutions. why has philosophy failed to ignore the saying (le dire), concentrating exclusively on the said (le dit)? language is not only and not primarily enunciation or expression, but rather communication – in talking or writing i always address my words (and myself ) to someone. i expect someone to hear me. in speaking or writing to him, i initiate a relation between myself and him. one way of hiding this relation (the saying) in the history of western philosophy has been by treating it as a phenomenon comparable to other phenomena. however, the other person to whom i speak is not there before me as a phenomenon that i can observe, study, and analyze, but as someone to whom i offer something that i have felt, heard, studied, written, or said. to be sure, i can look at the color of somebody’s eyes or contemplate someone’s beauty, which i can describe in a generic phenomenology, but my relation to the other does not have a phenomenological structure. by treating or observing another in the way that would be appropriate to a phenomenon, i prevent myself from having an encounter with this person. in order to face someone who looks back 31 peperzak, beyond: the philosophy of emmanuel levinas, p. 56. 32 ibid. 33 ibid., p. 61. 18 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college at me, i must separate myself from the identifying and thematizing attitude described earlier, for if i were to see the other as an interesting phenomenon (as someone with green eyes or a sweet voice), i would reduce the other’s otherness to an element of my thematic universe: the other consequently would become absent. as peperzak phrases it, in contrast to the phenomena that i can observe, the other whom i meet as other is invisible.34 or in the words of levinas, the other is not a phenomenon, but rather an enigma.35 the theoretical intention is thus essentially incapable of taking one of the most ordinary experiences of everyday life seriously: it cannot do justice to the fact that my words are addressed to someone. the problem with philosophy – and the temptation which levinas constantly tries to evade – is that, as soon as i want to concentrate on this experience, i betray it by making it into a theme. by becoming a theme, an address loses its very moment of saying, that by which its signification is communicative, and thus it loses its orientation towards an actual or possible hearer. the “to” has changed into an “in front of ” or “before” of an object that is present before consciousness. levinas wants to convey, through his innovative writing (as if through an epiphany), the vocative in our language, the irreducible relation to the addressee, which is present in every sentence and every message (saying “here i am!”, “me voici!”). levinas’ writing also attempts to reveal the inherent transcendence of communication, the fact that to speak is not comparable to noetico-noematic correlations,36 but rather to my offering the whole of my identifying acts – that is, the whole of my world – to someone who is not a part or moment or event within that whole. you, as the other, are not to be found in my world – for you come from afar – and my response to your facing me precedes, and is more fundamental than, the domain of phenomenal beings. all of my themes and identifications are meant first and foremost to be given to you for your acknowledgement or denial. in my contact or proximity to you there is the mark of “the one-for-the-other,” as levinas says.37 i give you my words – and myself – saying “see me, here and now,” and, in doing so, i am in the accusative case: for it is up to you to accept or deny my words, to accept or deny myself.38 i thus find myself in a position of a “passivity beyond passivity.” my obligations and responsibilities to you do not stem from any decision or contract originating in my will, for before i could even think, thematize, and freely choose, i have become responsible to you. every thematization and every thought of mine is given and addressed to you; on the hither side of every said of mine lies a saying filled with responsibility for you. 34 peperzak, beyond: the philosophy of emmanuel levinas, p. 63. 35 ibid. 36 in husserl’s terminology, the noetic content is the mental act (say, an act of liking, of judging, or of remembering), which is directed towards an intentionally held object, “noema” (say, a book, a landscape, or one’s childhood home). 37 peperzak, beyond: the philosophy of emmanuel levinas, p. 67. 38 the expressions “see me, here and now,” “here i am,” “i am in the accusative case,” and then later “a passivity beyond passivity” all comprise the levinasian terminology present throughout otherwise than being. 19issue iv f spring 2017 looks, gestures, and words 2.2. some points of agreement the position of ultimate passivity that i find myself in my ethical relation points to levinas’ maxim that “i am a hostage to the other.” as we have seen, lear’s wish to have a certificate of love from cordelia (a said) in exchange for land stands as a desperate attempt to avoid the ethical reality of ordinary language, to reduce the other to a theme or a term in a contract, to mask one’s existence as hostage to the finite other. by setting up rulebooks and contracts that take you and i as signatories, i avoid an ethical engagement. such was lear’s wish, but such was also saul kripke and john austin’s attempt to ground language on a rulebook (be it a manual on birdwatching), on something more “robust” and “independent” than the too-human other. kripke speaks of an “eerie feeling” when he realizes that “nothing ensures” that the other person will make the same mathematical projections as he has done in the past, for “there is no reason” we act and agree in language (or in mathematical functions) as we do.39 it as if, kripke says, “the entire idea of meaning vanishes into thin air.”40 cavell correctly responds by saying that something has vanished, but that in other ways it seems that language is “solider than ever.”41 suppose someone invites me to tea and lays out the toy tea set that belongs to his child’s doll, and then proceeds to pour. i might not be able to reason with him, but i have choices beyond breaking with him or going away: i might try to humor him, or show him my trustworthiness by sipping from the toy cup, or i might serve the tea to my doll.42 any said that we might agree upon (a theme in the rulebook) has vanished, but the “signifyingness” (to use levinas’ expression), the saying, the “one-for-the-other,” the communicative and vocative element of language remains. it is in this sense that, prior to and more fundamental than my certainty or knowledge that we employ the same terms in the same way, i have an ethical responsibility for you, as my other. such an idea unites cavell and levinas, turning both into outcasts in the drama of western philosophy. we can also find this sense of passivity, and of the purely vocative aspect of language, in cavell’s mention of rousseau in the final pages of the claim of reason. cavell takes as paradigmatic of the discovery and acknowledgment of the other the following “mythic” or “pre-historical” moment in rousseau’s essay on the origin of language: upon meeting others, a savage man will initially be frightened. because of his fear he sees the other as bigger and stronger than himself. he calls them giants… that is how the figurative word is born before the literal word, when our gaze is held in passionate fascination. 43 the first naming of the other is characterized by rousseau in the form of an exclamation: upon meeting the other, the savage man has an experience on the basis 39 cavell, philosophy the day after tomorrow, p. 135. 40 kripke, wittgenstein on rules and private language, p. 22. 41 cavell, philosophy the day after tomorrow, p. 136. 42 ibid. 43 see rousseau, essay on the origin of language, in the section entitled “that the first language had to be figurative.” 20 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college of which “he calls something out, something is called forth from him.”44 from the other’s sheer otherness comes the fright and fascination which rousseau defines in his mythic or pre-historic account as our exclamation and fascination with the other human being. levinas, in a most similar fashion, says that “the face is the fact that a being affects me not in the indicative, but in the imperative,”45 that the other is a thick moral presence to me, a giant, commanding me from a position of height. the one moment in which cavell distances himself from levinas – and this might be the biggest distinction between the two thinkers – is when he emphasizes that the other is ultimately not stronger or “higher” than the self. rousseau says that: after many experiences, the savage recognizes that these so-called giants are neither bigger nor stronger than he. their stature does not approach the idea he had initially attached to the word giant. so he invents another name common to them and to him, such as the name man, for example, and leaves giant to the fictitious object that had impressed him during his illusion.46 cavell follows rousseau’s reasoning by claiming that after the first frightful meeting with the other, the savage decides, on the basis of noticing the empirical analogies between himself and others, to displace the first name called forth from him (“giant”) in favor of another (“man”).47 it is crucial for cavell to recognize this no-more-thanhuman status of the other person, because the realization of the beloved’s finitude lies at the center of his interpretation of king lear. if the other is weak and finite, i am just as weak and finite for being dependent, through love, on that other. for levinas, however, the other always remains a giant, so to speak, for “the face, still a thing among things, breaks through the form that nevertheless delimits it.”48 the face is a physical entity, a thing among others, and yet it expresses the infinite, breaking through its finite form. the other presents me with an ungraspable infinity, for i cannot encompass him in my thoughts and theories, in my themes and categories. the other forever stays “infinitely transcendent, infinitely foreign.”49 if the other is my equal – and lear’s drama for cavell is the admission that he is just as equal, just as finite as the other – then my task is to accept my human condition and not hide in theatricality or deny acknowledgement. but if the other is my superior – and the philosopher’s drama for levinas is the admission that the other is not a theme in the phenomenal world – then my task is to renounce my autonomy and recognize my passivity towards the other. in both cases, there is a lowering: lear thinks of himself too highly and must now accept the lower condition of being just as human as cordelia; the philosopher wants to place the other among his themes and 44 cavell, the claim of reason, p. 466. 45 levinas, collected philosophical papers, p. 21. 46 see rousseau, essay on the origin of language, in the section entitled “that the first language had to be figurative.” 47 cavell, the claim of reason, p. 466. 48 levinas, totality and infinity, p. 197. 49 ibid. 21issue iv f spring 2017 looks, gestures, and words ideas, all of which are his creations, but the other stands outside as the receiving end and final destination of the philosopher’s thematization. the distinction between 1), the other being my finite equal and 2), the other being entirely outside my world, being “what i myself am not,”50 however, renders an important difference between cavell and levinas. since the cavellian other is as finite as i am, i might burden him by “placing infinite demands on finite sources,”51 and the other might similarly place monstrous burdens on me, in which case i can say “no,” i can choose not to engage (for in this scenario, either myself or the other has not acknowledged our common human finitude). for levinas, however, since the other is an infinity beyond grasp – not a part of my world of themes and ideas – my obligations and responsibilities to him stem from a most passive position, before any thought and thematization, and thus before any decision of my will. i have no choice but to say “yes” to the other if he approaches me with his nude face, without theatricality.52 although in no way do i expect to exhaust all possible comparisons between these highly complex thinkers, in general, we might state that each of them reacts to the dominance of scientific positivism, of the social sciences, of categorization, that is, of taking the human as a term in a language, instead of recognizing that individuals address and are addressed by one another. in admitting this fact of (ordinary) language, both thinkers equally envision the supremacy of ethics, and its indispensable primacy over all other intellectual pursuits. skepticism tries to sublimate language by reducing its very communicative element, its “signifyingness” to a term within the language. ethics would then be governed according to social contracts, legal books, societal norms, moral codes – anything that can be fixed and established. but as i have shown, that is both impossible and tragic. levinas and cavell both try to return us to the ethical, to its inescapable presence in ordinary life. if the title of “first philosophy” once belonged to metaphysics (with aristotle), then being transferred to epistemology (with descartes), we can now safely say that, for levinas and cavell, ethics is prima philosophia. as a concluding thought, i will end this investigation on levinas and cavell – the first of many others – with an aesthetic comparison. kant’s notion of the mathematical sublime might serve to describe the encounter with the levinasian other, which is an encounter with an infinite otherness that i cannot grasp (greifen).53 this mathematical 50 levinas, time and the other, p. 83. 51 cavell, the claim of reason, p. 470. 52 i include the conditional as a way to respond to the problem of hostages, which permeates levinasian scholarship. the british philosopher simon critchley, for instance, has touched on this issue. as he explains, the holocaust survivors who had invited him to speak in their london synagogue could not accept levinas’ command of being responsible for their persecutor. their reaction, which strongly invokes the remembrance of national socialism, made critchley think that levinas had gone too far, or become too “masochistic.” one way to avoid this problem is to say that the nazi guard does not present his face, in its destitution, nudity and vulnerability, but rather hides himself in the theatricality of cruelty. if there is a genuine human interaction, the ethical forcefulness of the other’s face commands me to say “yes.” 53 i have previously discussed this comparison between levinas’ ethics and kant’s aesthetics in an essay entitled “the epiphany of the face: levinas and the ethical-religious attitude,” which i presented at the 5th annual graduate and undergraduate student conference in philosophy, at san diego state university, on october 22 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college sublime arises when we are confronted with something so large that it overwhelms our sensory capacity, when we cannot apprehend the magnitude of a given object. looking at the starry night sky, for instance, with its multitude of galaxies and constellations, our senses reach up to a certain point, but reason can go further and conceive the idea of infinity, which exceeds any possible faculty of the imagination. analogously, the face of the other communicates an otherness which cannot possibly be grasped by sameness: “it cannot be comprehended, that is, encompassed. the other remains infinitely transcendent, infinitely foreign.”54 just as what lies beyond the stars, the other cannot receive a place in my phenomenal world, cannot be categorized in my sameness or apprehended and understood by my intelligence. a vision of the other is at most an epiphany, or ekstasis (“stepping outside”). for kant, the mathematical sublime contrasts, in its turn, with the dynamic sublime, and just as the first belongs to levinas, so would the second correspond to cavell. in kant’s words, the dynamic sublime is when nature creates a fearfulness “without us being afraid of it.”55 looking at immensely powerful waves hitting the rocks in the coast, we know they can annihilate us, wipe us out with one hit, and yet their awesome power does not give us a sense of threat from afar. analogously to cavell, you might not follow the same rules as i do, we might not mean the same by what we say, but rather than assuming the skeptical position of demanding conformity, i turn my spade expressing patience. my rulebooks might vanish into thin air, my kripkean wishes can be destroyed with a single hit, and yet i accommodate myself to the other; communication might threaten to break down in a second, but that opens for us the ethical realm of language without rules. f bibliography austin, john l., james urmson and geoffrey warnock. “other minds” philosophical papers. oxford: clarendon press, 1961. berkeley, george. three dialogues between hylas and philonous. new york: liberal arts, 1954. cavell, stanley. must we mean what we say: a book of essays. cambridge: cambridge university press, 1976. ——— philosophy the day after tomorrow. cambridge, ma: belknap of harvard university press, 2005. 14th, 2015. for more information regarding kant’s mathematical sublime, see ginsborg, “kant’s aesthetics and teleology” in the stanford encyclopedia of philosophy. for the full website, see ginsborg in the bibliography. 54 levinas, totality and infinity, p. 194. 55 kant, critique of judgment, § 28 23issue iv f spring 2017 looks, gestures, and words ——— the claim of reason: wittgenstein, skepticism, morality, and tragedy. oxford: clarendon, 1979. descartes, rené. meditationes de prima philosophia. translated by artur buchenau, lipsiae: meiner, 1913. ginsborg, hannah. “kant’s aesthetics and teleology.” stanford university. stanford university, 02 july 2005. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kant-aesthetics/. hammer, espen. stanley cavell: skepticism, subjectivity, and the ordinary. cambridge: polity, 2002. hume, david. an enquiry concerning human understanding: a letter from a gentleman to his friend in edinburgh. indianapolis: hackett pub., 1977. kant, immanuel. critique of judgment. translated by j. h. bernard new york: hafner pub., 1951. ——— critique of pure reason. translated by paul guyer and allenn w. wood. cambridge: cambridge university press, 1999. kripke, saul a. wittgenstein on rules and private language: an elementary exposition. cambridge, ma: harvard university press, 1982. levinas, emmanuel. humanism of the other. translated by nidra poller. urbana, il: university of illinois, 2006. ———ethics and infinity. translated by philippe nemo. pittsburgh: duquesne university press, 1985. ——— time and the other: and additional essays. translated by richard a. cohen. pittsburgh: duquesne university press, 1987. ——— collected philosophical papers. translated by dordrecht, the netherlands: nijhoff, 1987. ——— difficult freedom: essays on judaism. baltimore: johns hopkins university press, 1990. ——— otherwise than being, or, beyond essence. pittsburgh, pa: duquesne university press, 1998. ——— totality and infinity: an essay on exteriority. pittsburgh, pa: duquesne university press, 1969. peperzak, adriaan theodoor. beyond: the philosophy of emmanuel levinas. evanston, il: northwestern university press, 1999. pessoa, fernando. poesias inéditas (1930-1935). lisboa: edições atica. plato, and nicholas denyer. protagoras. cambridge: cambridge university press, 2008. 24 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college rousseau, jean-jacques. essay on the origin of languages. translated by johann gottfried. chicago: university of chicago, 1966. wittgenstein, ludwig, philosophical investigations: the german text, with a revised english translation. translated by g.e.m. anscombe. oxford: blackwell, 2001. διανοιαd i a n o i athe undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college spring 2019 issue vi editor-in-chief: peter klapes senior managing editor: noah valdez managing editors: weitao liu, ethan yates general editors: benjamin dewhurst, christopher fahey, jennifer howard, gregory kacergis, brian kominick, ana luque, elizabeth lopreiato, jacob schick, alexander turney, lauren white, madeline wolfe, xinyu zhou external reviewers: jeremy freudberg (boston university), justin messmer (boston university), tristan st. germain (brown university), alexander stooshinoff (concordia university) communications editor: jessica flores graduate advisor: myles casey faculty advisor: ronald tacelli, s.j. cover designs courtesy of gregory kacergis. featuring: cézanne, paul the card players. 1892-1893; obtained via wikimedia commons. the materials herein represent the personal opinions of the individual authors and do not necessarily represent the views of dianoia or boston college. if you have questions regarding the journal, would like to submit your work for review, or if you’d be interested in joining next year’s staff, please contact the journal at dianoia@bc.edu. dianoia the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college spring 2019 issue vi boston college 140 commonwealth avenue chestnut hill, ma 02467 https://www.bc.edu/bc-web/schools/mcas/departments/philosophy/undergraduate/dianoia.html © 2019 the trustees of boston college printed by progressive print solutions. c o n t e n t s 4 acknowledgements 6 a letter from the editor 8 merleau-ponty and barthes on image consciousness: probing the (im)possibility of meaning natasha beaudin pearson, mcgill university 19 the horror of the real: filmic form, the century, and fritz lang's m peter gavaris, boston college 29 phenomenological reproduction in thompson and mailer's new journalism brendan chambers, boston college 44 cognition, domination, and complexity ryan cardoza, stony brook university 61 walter benjamin's "über den begriff der geschichte" and the marxist tradition maxwell wade, rutgers university 75 patočka's critique of husserl: the possibility of a-subjective phenomenology gabriel vidal, pontifical catholic university of chile 91 review of discomfort and moral impediment myles casey , the pennsylvania state university 98 contributors 4 the editorial staff of dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college would like to extend our sincerest thanks to the following individuals for their assistance in making this issue of dianoia possible: nancy adams, bc libraries mary crane, institute for the liberal arts susan dunn, center for centers gary gurtler, s.j., philosophy department stephen jarjoura, information technology services peter marino, center for centers cherie mcgill, philosophy department sarah melton, bc libraries dermot moran, philosophy department john o'connor, bc libraries paula perry, philosophy department sarah smith, philosophy department christopher soldt, media technology services zachary willcutt, philosophy department we would also like to thank dr. ronald tacelli, s.j., of the boston college philosophy department, for his invaluable assistance as our advisor. acknowledgements 5issue vi ◆ spring 2019 δι αν οι α 6 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college spring 2019 dear reader, with immense pleasure and honor, i have the opportunity to present to you, once again, the culmination of rigorous scholarship, collaboration, and generosity. issue vi of dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college represents, indeed, the world’s finest undergraduate work in philosophy. we were delighted this year to have received over 150 submissions from around the world, and our published articles and book review are the fruits of dianoia’s collaboration with scholars from north america, south america, and europe. in fact, earlier this year, we were approached by cambridge scholars publishing (newcastle upon tyne, uk) to publish a review of the argentine philosopher julio cabrera’s latest work on bioethics, discomfort and moral impediment: the human situation, radical bioethics, and procreation. our graduate advisor, myles casey, has kindly offered a thought-provoking explication and review of cabrera’s work. our publication mandate has remained: “dianoia publishes the world’s finest and most thoughtful, original, and creative papers on any philosophical topic or idea.” the papers in our current issue accordingly present thoughtful and original philosophical work that engages with some of philosophy’s most revered fields of scholarship, including hermeneutics, phenomenology, philosophical anthropology, the philosophy of politics, as well as film theory, critical theory, and the philosophy of communication. in many ways, our selections this year represent our editorial staff’s training in a robust and dynamic department of philosophy, which has uniquely provided us with, among other things, world-class training in contemporary continental philosophy. i am certain that such training will continue to influence our annual review and will continue to keep us firmly in our position as a top journal of undergraduate work in philosophy. in many ways, the design of our front and back covers represents the ubiquity of the philosophical dialogue that dianoia—and the journal’s name further suggests this—proudly features. the dialogue—such as that occurring on our front and back covers—transcends physical borders and enables, as it does in cézanne’s work, its interlocutors to share a drink and a game of cards over philosophy. as you will see, our own choice of cover design, inspired by this issue’s piece on roland barthes, maurice merleau-ponty, and paul cézanne, is already a manifestation of such a dialogical act. it is with bittersweet sentiments that i conclude my letter this year, as i will be stepping down from my post as editor-in-chief to focus on my graduate studies here at boston college. before i close, however, i would like to express my sincerest gratitude to those who have supported me during my editorial tenure. first and foremost, i would like to thank all dianoia editors, past and present, whose 6issue vi ◆ spring 2019 a l e t t e r f r o m t h e e d it o r 7issue vi ◆ spring 2019 philosophical expertise and keen eye have made the journal what it is today. my colleagues (and, above all, friends), noah valdez, weitao liu, and ethan yates, in dianoia’s ‘upper-level management,’ as we call it, deserve my heartfelt thanks. i am greatly indebted to our faculty advisor, fr. ron tacelli, for his generous words of encouragement and generous supply of dinner and snacks during our late-night editorial sessions. i thank the boston college philosophy department and the institute for the liberal arts, directed by dr. mary crane, for the support, both in-kind and financial. paula perry, of the boston college philosophy department, deserves a word of sincere thanks for her advocacy, support, expertise, and graciousness. i thank, also, gregory kacergis, of boston college’s media technology services for turning our philosophical review into a work of art—his patience, and above all, his friendship, does not go unnoticed. and, at this point, as i officially complete my undergraduate studies at boston college, i would like to thank publicly my family, as well as those friends, colleagues, and supporters who have made this and many other endeavors possible. happy reading! sincerely, peter klapes editor-in-chief 8 δι αν οι α merleau-ponty and barthes on image consciousness: probing the (im)possibility of meaning natasha beaudin pearson for both maurice merleau-ponty and roland barthes, images are not merely objects in space; they belong to the realm of the metaphysical. paintings “move” us, according to merleau-ponty: their “quality, light, color, depth […] awaken an echo in our bod[y] and […] our body welcomes them.”1 to encounter a painting is to apprehend it through one’s body. we constitute “brute meaning” by drawing upon the “fabric of the world” in which our bodies are inextricably caught.2 conversely, for barthes, poignant photographs “wound” us: they contain an “element [the punctum] that rises from the scene, shoots out of it like an arrow, and pierces” us.3 unlike merleau-ponty, barthes believes that pictures resist meaning-making. they provoke an “internal agitation,” an “animation” in the viewer. yet this “affect” cannot wholly be reduced or explained.4 hence, i think the crux of merleau-ponty’s and barthes’ disagreement about the ontology of image consciousness has to do with the possibility of meaning-making (or lack thereof ). while merleau-ponty believes that a painting can be meaningful and express the essential “indivisible whole[ness]” and “imperious 1 maurice merleau-ponty, “eye and mind,” in the merleau-ponty aesthetics reader, ed. galen johnson (evanston, il: northwestern up, 1993), 125. 2 ibid., 123. 3 roland barthes, camera lucida, trans. richard howard (new york: hill and wang, 1981), 26. 4 barthes, camera lucida, 19-20. 9issue vi ◆ spring 2019 merleau-ponty and barthes on image consciousness unity” of the world,5 barthes contends that “since every photograph is contingent (and thereby outside of meaning), photography cannot signify (aim at a generality) except by assuming a mask.”6 in this paper, i outline barthes’ critique of merleauponty’s phenomenology of painting—and his phenomenology more generally—and propose how we might explain the two philosophers’ disagreements on the subject. for merleau-ponty, paintings do more than just depict the world: they “attempt” to become “a piece of nature.”7 phenomenology, the philosophical current merleauponty belonged to, posits that as humans, we are embodied subjects living in the world, which we experience through our sensations (our perception). one’s body is not merely “a chunk of space or a bundle of functions” distinct from one’s consciousness; rather, one’s body is one’s consciousness.8 the soul “thinks according to the body, not according to itself ” because the body is what grounds all cognition. it is the “degree zero of spatiality” from which i see the world around me.9 in other words, it is impossible to understand the world “from the exterior” because i am “immersed” in it; i live it “from the inside.”10 the meaning that i give to the world is thus fundamentally informed by how i perceive it through my body. paintings, merleau-ponty contends, are the repositories of the meaning given to the painter through her vision and movement. the painter’s eye “is an instrument that moves itself, a means which invents its own ends; it is that which has been moved by some impact of the world, which it then restores to the visible through the traces of a hand.”11 for this reason, when we view a landscape painting by paul cézanne, we see how cézanne translated onto the canvas the sensations that he experienced when he laid eyes on a particular landscape.12 cézanne’s body was moved by the landscape that his eyes perceived, and this movement was transformed into the movement of his hands painting the landscape onto the canvas.13 as viewers, we see the painted landscape and are ourselves moved by it. thereby we imbue the painting with our own meaning(s). thus, the painting allows us not only to see as cézanne saw, but also to impart on it the countless other meanings that we may choose to give to it. for merleau-ponty, paintings are indeed inherently and endlessly meaningful. a person unfamiliar with the work of vincent van gogh might look at his painting wheatfield with crows (figure 1) and simply see a bright ochre wheat field under an inky blue sky. individuals who know that this was (supposedly) the last painting van gogh completed before committing suicide will likely add an extra layer of meaning 5 maurice merleau-ponty, “cézanne’s doubt,” in the merleau-ponty aesthetics reader, ed. galen johnson (evanston, il: northwestern up, 1993), 65. 6 barthes, camera lucida, 34. 7 merleau-ponty, “cézanne’s doubt,” 62 8 merleau-ponty, “eye and mind,” 124. 9 ibid., 138. 10 ibid. 11 ibid., 127. 12 merleau-ponty, “cézanne’s doubt,” 63. 13 ibid. 10 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college onto this first interpretation: they may see the artwork as an evocation of death (symbolized by the dark sky) looming over and encroaching upon life (symbolized by the vibrant wheat field). alternatively, an art historian might look at this painting and instead understand it through the lens of western art historical scholarship: she might take the flatness of the pictorial elements and the visibility of the brushstrokes as evidence that van gogh’s art foreshadowed modernism. a person who grew up on a farm and spent his childhood ploughing wheat fields may, upon viewing wheatfield with crows, be flooded with memories of his early years (such memories may include the first time his father showed him how to mount a horse, or the memory of running around the fields with his friends, or of how the fields smelled after the first snowfall). in each of these cases, individuals bestow onto van gogh’s painting meaning(s) that are informed by—but not limited to—her personal lived experience. giving meaning(s) to a painting, merleau-ponty argues, is an infinite act of interpretation: it is a hermeneutic.14 it is interpersonal and timeless; in fact, one person may give wheatfield with crows multiple different layers of meaning at different moments in her life. this shows that the process of meaning-making is never sterile nor static, but, instead, rich, fertile, and bound to never be fully complete.15 barthes’ account of meaning-making in photographs is markedly different. much like merleau-ponty, barthes thinks that pictures have the ability to “move” us (to borrow merleau-ponty’s language): they provoke a “pathos,” an “affect” in the “spectator [the viewer].”16 he pinpoints the source of affect as a detail he calls the “punctum,” which is present in every “attractive” photograph.17 on a mission to “formulate the fundamental feature, the universal without which there would be no photography,” barthes employs a “cynical phenomenology”18 in his analysis of photographs, which ultimately leads him to the conclusion that every compelling photo contains both a “studium” and a “punctum.”19 the studium, barthes posits, consists in “a kind of general, enthusiastic commitment […] without special acuity” that every photograph possesses.20 meaning “study” in latin, studium designates both a vague disinterest in the consumption of certain cultural products and a “kind of education” that allows one “to encounter the photographer’s intentions, to enter into harmony with them, to disapprove of them, but always to understand them, to argue them within myself for culture (from which the studium derives) is a contract arrived at between creators and consumers.”21 the photographer (“operator”) communicates her intended meaning by using visual codes that are universal and can thus be deciphered by spectators.22 barthes uses william klein’s photo, “mayday, 1959,” as an example. in this picture, 14 merleau-ponty, “eye and mind,” 149. 15 ibid. 16 barthes, camera lucida, 21. 17 ibid, 27. 18 ibid., 9. 19 ibid., 26. 20 ibid. 21 barthes, camera lucida, 27-28. 22 ibid., 28. 11issue vi ◆ spring 2019 merleau-ponty and barthes on image consciousness the studium would be the fact that i can make sense of the subject of the photo, and that i can learn certain ethnographical and historical details by examining it.23 i can discern a black and white photograph of an old woman with a suspicious glance, who is surrounded by a few men of different ages. i notice that one boy is wearing a blazer, that another has a youthful haircut, and that the old woman is wearing a scarf around her head, for instance. the photograph “teaches me how russians dress” in moscow in 1959.24 in other words, i recognize this picture as a “good [coherent and identifiable] historical scene.”25 however, without searching for it, there is an “element” in this photograph that “rises from the scene, shoots out of it like an arrow, and pierces me.”26 barthes names this element the punctum and defines it as “that accident which pricks me (but also bruises me, is poignant to me).”27 he claims that the punctum is usually a small detail that was not strictly intended by the operator. its “wounding” quality cannot be analyzed or studied, but is instead “given right there on the page” and resonates with the spectator.28 barthes seems to imply that a photograph’s punctum may differ from one spectator to another when he says that “to give examples of punctum is, in a certain fashion, to give myself up.”29 if we accept this and grant that a punctum is subjective, then we may posit that what “wounds” an individual depends on that individual’s past lived experiences. nevertheless, if one tests this out phenomenologically, one quickly finds that what wounds someone does not always directly map onto that person’s past memories, and thus cannot be easily explained. for example, in james van der zee’s “family portrait” (figure 3), barthes identifies the punctum as the “belt worn low” by, and the “strapped pumps”30 of, the woman standing behind the chair. barthes is baffled by the fact that this detail strikes him: “(mary janes – why does this dated fashion touch me? i mean: to what date does it refer me?).”31 personally, when i look at this picture, the detail i identify as the punctum is the seated woman’s right hand. when i try to understand why this element in particular “pricks” me, i can only say that the way in which the hand curves awkwardly over the armrest, and how one finger seems abnormally long, makes me uncomfortable, or “creeps me out.” this, however, is not a satisfying answer. what exactly bothers me about this woman’s hand? why do the strapped pumps arouse “great sympathy [and] almost a kind of tenderness” in barthes?32 23 ibid., 30. 24 ibid., 30. 25 ibid., 26. 26 ibid. 27 barthes, camera lucida, 26. 28 ibid., 43. 29 ibid. 30 ibid. 31 ibid. 32 barthes, camera lucida, 43 12 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college the punctum significantly impacts one’s understanding of the photograph: it “lashe[s]” the order and facile meaning of the studium and “changes my reading [of the photograph]”, “mark[ing] [it] in my eyes with a higher value.”33 ever since the woman’s right hand in james van der zee’s “family portrait” “punctured” me, the only thing i can see when i look at that photograph is that gnarled hand. as barthes succinctly puts it, the punctum suddenly—and paradoxically—“while remaining a ‘detail,’ fills the whole picture.”34 yet, as barthes asks, why is this the case? why must i disturb the “unity of composition” that was found in the studium that constituted “family portrait” before the punctum wounded me?35 after all, “whether or not [the punctum] is triggered, it is an addition. it is what i add to the photograph and what is nonetheless already there.”36 why must this addition—this newfound meaning i give to “family portrait”—be made? why must the facile meaning of its studium (which allows me to understand the picture in historical/ethnographical terms, as a family portrait of an african american family living in harlem in 1926) be supplanted by the deeply disturbing and incomplete meaning engendered by the punctum, which reduces the entire photograph to the creepy hand? moreover, why do i choose to impart meaning to something that seems irreducible, that seems to resist it?37 i continue to ask: why do i think the woman’s hand is creepy? if this persistent uncertainty tells me anything, it is that “the incapacity to name is a good symptom of disturbance.”38 attempting to answer these questions, barthes draws on certain notions of psychoanalytic theory. he introduces the concept of heimlich39 (german for “familiar,” “native,” “belonging to the home”), which closely relates to its opposite notion, unheimlich (german for “uncanny”), an idea that is discussed in freud’s essay, “the uncanny.”40 freud defines “the uncanny” as “an experience of tension” that belongs to “that class of the terrifying which leads back to something long known to us, once very familiar.”41 freud uses “the double” as an example of the uncanny: having connections with “reflections in mirrors, with shadows, spirits, with the belief in the soul and the fear of death,” seeing one’s doppelgänger (for instance, when i look at a picture of myself or catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror) “arouses dread and creeping horror.”42 though uncanny situations occur in real life, freud argues that the uncanny is also “an aesthetic category”: the feeling can emerge when we consume literature, songs, movies, and other art forms.43 personally, one of the first 33 ibid., 42. 34 ibid., 45. 35 ibid., 41. 36 ibid., 55. 37 barthes, camera lucida, 21. 38 ibid., 51. 39 ibid., 40. 40 sigmund freud, “the uncanny,” 2, accessed 2 december 2017, http://web.mit.edu/allanmc/www/freud1.pdf. 41 freud, “the uncanny,” 2. 42 ibid., 10. 43 ibid., 2. 13issue vi ◆ spring 2019 merleau-ponty and barthes on image consciousness artworks that comes to mind when i think of the uncanny is lars von trier’s film breaking the waves (1996) (figure 4), which tells the story of bess, an unusual woman who is in love with her husband jan, an oil rig worker who asks her to have sex with other men after he is gravely injured in a work accident. it is a dark, tragic story of sexual debasement, religious paranoia and death. these are certainly disturbing themes, but i do not know exactly why breaking the waves disturbs me more than most horror movies, which deal with similarly frightening topics such as murder, torture, and ghosts. this inability to explain fully my uneasiness or to give meaning to my experience is precisely what constitutes the uncanny, according to freud: “we, with the superiority of rational minds, are able to detect the sober truth; and yet this knowledge does not lessen the impression of uncanniness in the least degree.”44 in photographs, what is uncanny is the punctum, which, as we have said, is the detail in the photo that pricks me, that disrupts the studium’s harmony, order, and identifiable meaning. to make sense of the punctum and of the uncanny, we may turn to freud’s “beyond the pleasure principle.” in his 1920 essay, he postulates the existence of two fundamental principles that drive human behavior: the pleasure principle and the “death instinct.”45 the pleasure principle states that our bodies (and minds) are designed to rid themselves of tension (what freud calls “unpleasure”; this includes hunger, thirst, and sexual desire), such that all of our actions are motivated by “a lowering of that tension – that is, […] an avoidance of unpleasure or a production of pleasure.”46 this drive is productive and life-sustaining, as it seeks to restore our constitution to a state of balance and harmony. at first glance, this seems intuitive and accurate. yet, upon treating numerous patients who suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder, freud realized that the pleasure principle offered an incomplete account of human behaviour. his patients, most of whom had fought in world war i, would constantly recall their most painful memories (consciously, in therapy and unconsciously, in dreams), “reviv[ing] them with the greatest ingenuity.”47 but this repetition is stale, unproductive, and contradicts the pleasure principle: instead of releasing tension, this “compulsion to repeat” only heightens tension, only disturbs our constitution, and only generates imbalance and chaos.48 freud cannot explain these “mysterious masochistic trends of the ego” that all humans seem to bear, but nonetheless we cannot deny their existence.49 this leads him to posit the existence of a second fundamental drive that opposes the pleasure principle and seeks to negate it: the “death instinct.”50 44 freud, “the uncanny,” 7. 45 sigmund freud, salman akhtar, and mary k. o'neil, on freud's "beyond the pleasure principle" (london: karnac books, 2011), 55. 46 freud et al., “beyond the pleasure principle,” 13. 47 freud et al., “beyond the pleasure principle,” 27. 48 ibid., 25. 49 ibid., 19. 50 ibid., 55. 14 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college freud’s account of these two antagonistic—but intertwined—drives maps onto barthes’ theory of photography. the pleasure principle (or “eros”) corresponds to the studium: both embody harmony, order, balance, cohesion, and meaning. meanwhile, the death instinct is analogous to the punctum. both the death instinct and the punctum disturb the harmony and meaning of the pleasure principle and the studium, respectively. this meaning is intelligible: james van der zee’s “family portrait” is the picture of an african-american family living in harlem in 1926. the woman’s eerie hand becomes such a fixation to me that i ignore all of the other elements present in “family portrait”; the death instinct causes traumatic war memories to repeatedly resurface in freud’s patients’ minds, thereby shattering all semblance of serenity, harmony, or meaning. both cases indeed resist meaning: nothing can fully capture what makes the contorted hand creepy to me, and nothing can explain why this particular detail resonates within me but not necessarily within every other spectator. likewise, the veterans’ stale repetition of painful memories cannot be contextualized by any philosophical or scientific system; it refuses to be understood within the organized, satisfying framework of the pleasure principle. thus, barthes’ main disagreement with merleau-ponty has to do with the latter’s belief that images (and especially paintings) are endlessly meaningful. according to barthes, pictures have a limited semiology: “all we can say is that the [photograph] speaks, it induces us, vaguely to think.”51 the photograph’s meaning is evident and restrained: it can be recognized by any spectator. indeed, anyone who looks at william klein’s “mayday, 1959” will say that it is a picture of an old woman with a scarf wrapped around her head, gazing menacingly at the lens, and surrounded by seven men of varying ages. more specifically, the work’s title informs us that these people are in moscow in 1959. this is the definite subject of “mayday, 1959”: the photo will never be about tulips in seventeenth century amsterdam, or fishermen in nineteenth century brazil. thus, even though an image may provoke different emotions in viewers, the image’s meaning will always be contingent, circumscribed, and “a closed field of forces.”52 it is therefore incorrect to claim, as merleau-ponty would, that “mayday, 1959” can be interpreted in an infinite number of ways. spectators might be wounded by different punctums, which are, as barthes puts it, “outside of meaning.”53 however, for all viewers the photo’s studium, which “aim[s] at generality […] by assuming a mask,” is the same.54 barthes challenges merleau-ponty’s contention that paintings “come to life” and make visible “the overtaking, the overlapping, the metamorphosis […] of time.”55 instead, barthes claims, they freeze time: they capture a moment that is dead and that is bound never to happen again. barthes indeed believes that death “is the eidos” (the 51 barthes, camera lucida, 38. 52 ibid., 13. 53 barthes, camera lucida, 34. 54 ibid. 55 merleau-ponty, “eye and mind,” 145. 15issue vi ◆ spring 2019 merleau-ponty and barthes on image consciousness essence) of photography.56 to view a photo capturing a moment that one has lived is to be reminded of the fleetingness of one’s life and of the inevitability of death. many photographs—especially ones dating back to a time when sitters had to pose for several hours when they had their picture taken—possess a haunting, “deathly” quality. (“family portrait” is the perfect example of this phenomenon: the figures appear to be spectral—far from “life-like.”) barthes argues that the experience of being photographed is also like death: the photographer’s “target” (subject) experiences “a micro-version of death (of parenthesis): i am truly becoming a specter, […] death in person.”57 this is because i feel like i am being transformed from a “subject into [an] object”: whenever someone takes my picture, i feel a strange sense of inauthenticity, for i perceive my “real” self being misrepresented—distorted even—by the camera lens.58 conscious that i am being watched (and “captured” by another person), i pose and change my behaviour in a “cunning dissociation of consciousness from identity.”59 moreover, when i look at a portrait of myself, i feel alienated, for my deep “self ” “never coincides with my image”: while i am “light,” moving, and alive, my image is “heavy [and] motionless”—in short, dead.60 it is no coincidence then that barthes relates photography to freud’s “death instinct.” death punctures life much like the punctum disrupts the studium and the death drive obstructs the pleasure principle. life is not intrinsically meaningful; rather, we bestow meaning onto it because our existence would seem pointless otherwise. by extension, paintings can never be “alive” or meaningful in the way that merleau-ponty claims they are. hence, merleau-ponty and barthes appear to be in a stalemate on the question of meaning-making in image consciousness. merleau-ponty offers a convincing argument for the hermeneutic possibilities of painting, but his theory does not consider the death instinct. moreover, while both philosophers agree that images have the ability to affect us (whether by wounding us or by moving us), barthes’ concepts of the studium and the punctum do not easily map onto merleau-ponty’s theory. this makes comparing both accounts tricky. added to this is the fact that they focus on different visual mediums: barthes mostly talks about photography, whereas merleau-ponty only discusses painting. the two thus seem to approach the same question with a different set of considerations, and this might be why they arrive at radically different conclusions. perhaps merleau-ponty crystallizes the conundrum best: “ambiguity is the essence of human existence, and everything we live or think has always several meanings,”—including meaninglessness.61 ◆ 56 barthes, camera lucida, 15. 57 barthes, 14. 58 ibid., 13. 59 barthes, camera lucida, 12. 60 ibid. 61 richard askay and jensen farquhar, apprehending the inaccessible: freudian psychoanalysis and existential phenomenology (evanston, il: northwestern university press, 2006), 296. 16 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college figure 1: vincent van gogh, wheatfield with crows, 1890. 50.2 cm × 103 cm (19.9 in × 40.6 in). van gogh museum, amsterdam. figure 2: william klein, “mayday, 1959”. moscow, 1959. 17issue vi ◆ spring 2019 merleau-ponty and barthes on image consciousness figure 3: james van der zee, “family portrait”. harlem, 1926. figure 4: lars von trier, breaking the waves (1996). 18 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college bibliography askay, richard, and jensen farquhar. apprehending the inaccessible: freudian psychoanalysis and existential phenomenology. evanston, il: northwestern university press, 2006. barthes, roland. camera lucida. translated by richard howard. new york: hill and wang, 1981. freud, sigmund, salman akhtar, and mary k. o'neil. on freud's "beyond the pleasure principle." london: karnac books, 2011. freud, sigmund. “the uncanny.” accessed 2 december 2017. http://web.mit.edu/ allanmc/www/freud1.pdf. merleau-ponty, maurice. “cézanne’s doubt.” in the merleau-ponty aesthetics reader, 59-75. edited by galen johnson. evanston, il: northwestern up, 1993. merleau-ponty, maurice. “eye and mind”. in the merleau-ponty aesthetics reader, 121-149. edited by galen johnson. evanston, il: northwestern up, 1993. 19issue vi ◆ spring 2019 δι αν οι α the horror of the real: filmic form, the century, and fritz lang's m peter gavaris near the end of the century, alain badiou comes to the conclusion that “the art of the century inscribed itself paradigmatically between dance and cinema.”1 he never explains this development explicitly, though it can be reasoned that he arrived at this conclusion through a consideration of the immediacy inherent to the nature of both forms. evidently, dance and cinema share a fixation on dynamic movement, and for badiou, this distinguishes them from everything that came before, especially since the century “violently declares the present of art.”2 in what follows, i will focus specifically on cinema and the cinematic role as the essential art form of badiou’s century. i will begin by considering why film has been taken up by so many contemporary theorists, examining why the medium (seemingly defined by its constitutional conundrums) lends itself so easily to analysis, and conclude with a consideration of fritz lang’s m (1931), a film that embodies many of the central ideas presented in the century. cinema, from its conception at the end of the nineteenth century, differentiated itself first and foremost by the way it was to be consumed. unlike reading a book or looking at a painting, the act of watching a film always involves something of a 1 badiou, alain. the century, trans. alberto toscano. malden: polity, 2008, p. 160. 2 badiou, the century, 135 20 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college power dynamic in the way that it strips the viewer of autonomy. we cede all control when we enter the dark room, look up at the bright screen, and gaze as images unremittingly flash before us until the credits roll. conversely, we choose the pace at which to read a book; we can deliberate over certain words, re-read pages, and put the book down whenever we want. the same could be said of looking at a painting, since the act still leaves us with our autonomy. we can look away whenever we want, and the canvas is fundamentally static. given this essential difference, cinema aligns itself much more obviously with theatre, performance art, and dance, as badiou points out. these art forms originate from movements in a setting that requires us to relinquish control and from the construction of resemblance to our lives. this act of replication, whether it be naturalistic, expressionistic, or anything in between, is just that. apart from being far more democratic than theater or dance, film differentiates itself from these other forms in that its replication of life has greater potential for resembling life as it is, and duly, bears greater potential for abstraction. rather than watching the action play out in front of us with the naked eye—as is the case with these other forms of performance—cinema necessitates further layers of construction (and artifice) that are communicated by a director’s shot selection, the editing of scenes, among other things. when writing on film, walter benjamin observes: “the camera intervenes with the resources of its lowerings and liftings, its interruptions and isolations, its extensions and accelerations, its enlargements and reductions. the camera introduces us to unconscious optics as does psychoanalysis to unconscious impulses.”3 these “unconscious optics,” as benjamin puts it, come about through the dissonance between cinema’s base artificiality and its potential for capturing life in motion. consider the early lumière films that attempted to do just this. the arrival of a train (1896) is simply what its title implies (see figure 1). yet, it is much more than just that, since, as benjamin put it, “filmed behavior lends itself more readily to analysis because of its incomparably more precise statements of the situation […] it can be isolated more easily.”4 the same cannot be said for any other artistic form, even those that are movement-based, because it is the camera that imbues an image with meaning by subtracting something from it. life is at once imitated, and thusly, removed (indeed, benjamin would likely argue that “the aura” is that which is being removed). even in shooting life as it is (say, a train arriving at a station), the camera adds an unquantifiable number of variables to the equation: the shot angle, the shot length, the exposure, to name a few. these variables create a specific, irreplicable image for the camera frame. it is the frame itself that further complicates things. in many ways, shooting a film is an act of profound exclusion, since a shot is defined not only by what is in the frame, but also by what is excluded. a shot of a train 3 walter benjamin. “the work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction.” the norton anthology of theory and criticism, ed. vincent b. leitch. w. w. norton & company, inc., 2001: 1181. 4 benjamin, “the work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction,” 1180-1181. 21issue vi ◆ spring 2019 the horror of the real arriving at a station implicitly asks us to consider what is occurring outside of the frame. therefore, the frame is at once finite—and infinite—and this constitutive contradiction lies at the heart of the medium, which makes film the definitive art form of the century, and an object of curiosity for theorists like benjamin and badiou. figure 1 badiou takes up cinema’s infinite finitude in his chapter on “the infinite.” for him, cinema is almost deceitfully deceptive in its promise of showing us life as it is, and the harsh reality that the medium’s replication of life is wholly artificial. after all, what is cinema other than a series of still images flashed quickly before us in such a way as to imply movement? in any case, badiou’s conception of the real, which he correlates to the infinite, can never be replicated in art, including cinema: “the torment of contemporary art in the face of the infinite situates it between a programmatic forcing that announces the return of romantic pathos, on the one hand, and a nihilistic iconoclasm, on the other.”5 cinema is situated nicely at this crossroads, as i’ve explained, because it seems almost to hold these two conflicting ideals (a “romantic pathos” and a “nihilistic iconoclasm”) at once, in that its infinite quality only comes about in its shear finitude. every shot is utterly unique and cannot be replicated perfectly; yet, the shot’s artificial construction allows for said uniqueness. consciously or otherwise, every film carries with it this inherent contradictory, romantic promise of the infinite, which arises from its own formal limitations, as badiou acknowledges: “the infinite is not captured in form; it transits through form […] finite form can be equivalent to an infinite opening.”6 since the film’s form loudly announces its own ineptitude, we are pointed to this infinite opening more frequently than when engaging with other artistic forms. 5 badiou, the century, p. 155. 6 ibid., p. 155. 22 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college in exploring the dichotomy between art’s “romantic pathos” and “nihilistic iconoclasm,” badiou spends noticeably more time addressing the latter, focusing on how the “art of subtraction” renders the medium inoperative. (this exemplified by his lengthy analysis of malevich's white on white.) admittedly, art can function as a study of surfaces, critiquing its own medium while also incorporating narrative elements and interiority. as discussed, cinema intrinsically seems able to hold these two contradictory elements at once. badiou’s reluctance to take up film as an “art of subtraction” that does not inherently eschew interiority is somewhat disappointing. with that, this essay will henceforth attempt to amend this fact by applying a badiousian reading to m (1931), a film that succinctly embodies much of the theory presented in the century. a far cry from the early cinema of the lumière brothers, fritz lang’s m is one of heightened drama and hyperstylization, featuring exquisite sets, ostentatious camerawork, and dynamic performances. m’s formal qualities belong to the german expressionist movement. founded on the basis that abstraction could better emulate a sense of interiority than strict, naturalistic representation, expressionism draws attention to itself as artificial (and it makes perfect sense that a form predicated on artificiality would take up abstraction in such a way as to carve out a greater opening for the badiousian real to transit through). m’s expressionism seems far from the art of subtraction that badiou discusses in the century, and yet, it arrives at a similar impasse. expressionism and film go hand in hand precisely because cinema is expressionistic in nature, and lang’s film embodies this synthesis, as the apparent, meticulous construction of its images gives way to a newfound interiority. wedged between two world wars, m appears to present itself as a procedural, almost rudimentary, crime thriller about a string of child murders, before revealing itself to be an eerily prophetic critique of a society ready to embrace totalitarianism. the mystery of the story is not so much about the identity of the killer—who we learn early on is hans beckert (peter lorre)—but is rather about the lengths to which the residents of berlin will go to capture him. lang commits to highlighting the interconnectedness of the “society of the century,” showing how seemingly everybody (from the police force, to the crime bosses, and even the beggars) is working to get this man for a smattering of different and self-serving reasons. by the end, the crime bosses, helped by regular residents who form a sort of citizens’ tribunal, capture beckert. they conduct an unfair trial and commit to killing him before the authorities rush in to break up the party. all this comes after beckert gives a rousing monologue as the tortured killer, expressing in between shrieks and screams the compulsivity of his actions in a surprisingly affecting call for sympathy. this climactic sequence of the citizens’ trial and beckert’s pleading marks a key moment in the film where lang pulls the wool from our eyes and turns the table on the residents of berlin (see figures 2 & 3). badiou argues that war and extreme violence in the century come as 23issue vi ◆ spring 2019 the horror of the real a result of passion for the real: a stark idealism that requires violence before peace. in what will follow, i aim to argue that this passion for the real is not manifested in beckert’s compulsive kills, but is rather embodied in the citizens’ desire to “put [him] out of commission.”7 for the film’s residents of berlin, the real can only be actualized by exterminating this evil from within their own society. when outlining his method for approaching the century, badiou explains that he wants to examine “how the century thought its own thought.”8 i wish to do the same by considering lang’s film as an artifact of the century, a work of profound self-diagnosis that will provide further insight into how the century thought of itself. in the century, badiou seemingly co-opts the lacanian real to refer to that which is unsignifyable: “representation is a symptom (to be read or deciphered) of a real that it subjectively localizes in the guise of misrecognition.”9 the real, as conceived of, and explained by, badiou, refers to a plane of perfection that is perpetually out of reach, separated from us by a gap. nonetheless, this passion for the real inspires the destruction, subtraction, and formalization that seem only to manifest in either art or violence. idealism, more than anything else, becomes the driving force behind this passion for the real since the passion itself comes from a belief that the gap between semblance and real can be transcended. badiou explains this idea in relation to nazi thought before concluding that “passion for the real is devoid of morality […] extreme violence is therefore the correlate of extreme enthusiasm.”10 it, therefore, becomes paramount to acknowledge that nazism, or any other form of oppressive regime, bears an ideology. as horrific as it may sound, it is a fundamental optimism—that of attaining the real—that accounts for so much violence in the century that badiou claims is defined by its passion: “bad violence must be followed 7 lang, m. 8 badiou, the century, p. 3. 9 ibid., p. 49. 10 ibid., p. 63. figure 2 figure 3 24 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college by good violence, which is legitimated by the former […] the good war will put an end to the bad war.”11 in turn, it makes perfect sense to view berlin’s residents’ totalitarian, self-serving desire to kill beckert as a passion for the real. surely, the perversity of the situation manifests itself in the simple fact that the residents of berlin are acting reasonably—at least initially—when it comes to their desire to catch beckert (since he represents a legitimate threat to their society). their crusade, their “just war,” is justifiable up until the point at which society collectively decides that beckert is less than human and undeserving of justice. this almost casual change in mindset has profound consequences, as badiou explains, in that it accounts for much of the violence of the century: “the century's real problem is to be located in the linkage between ‘democracies’ and that which, after the fact, they designate as their other […] what needs to be undone is precisely this discursive procedure of absolution.”12 the film’s title refers to the chalk letter “m” (for murderer) slapped onto beckert’s back at one point in the film (see figure 4). this moment holds significant import in that it represents the moment when beckert is explicitly made to be other; he becomes the target. the citizens, in turn, find no issue in making beckert the ostensive other in accordance with the belief that his elimination will allow for a lasting peace: “the twentieth century's idea of war is that of the decisive war, of the last war.”13 it is this stark optimism—and an inability to see beyond the present moment and situation—that allows for this sort of barbarous, ideological collective consciousness to take shape. 11 ibid., p. 30. 12 ibid., p. 5. 13 ibid., p. 34. figure 4 25issue vi ◆ spring 2019 the horror of the real lang effortlessly makes us aware of this shifting subjectivity through the use of cinematic techniques that informs our internalization of the narrative. notice, for instance, the way most of the action is staged throughout the film. the scenes where beckert is being chased through the streets are shot using high-angle long shots (see figure 5). shots of this kind emphasize the smallness of these characters, making them appear almost like pawns in a game as they chase each other down corridors and dark alleys. the camera shoots them at a distance to represent the metaphorical distance established between these characters and the viewer. by the film’s conclusion, lang closes this distance, through his use of close-ups, in order to evoke our sympathy for this character. if the long shots before were meant to imply distance, then these close-ups, like the famous one of beckert pleading (see figure 6), are meant to elicit empathy and imply interiority. writing on the close-up shot, benjamin concludes: “with the close-up, space expands […] the enlargement of a snapshot does not simply render more precise what in any case was visible, though unclear: it reveals entirely new structural formations on the subject.”14 surely, the power of the film’s ending comes in our acknowledgement of the newly discovered structural formations of beckert’s character. notable, too, is the fact that we can only collapse this emotional distance as lang does in film: live performance cannot replicate the cinematic freedom that comes with using a camera. adding to the novelty of m is the fact that the crime bosses, and not the police, mastermind the plan to capture and to try beckert’s. we come to realize that the heightened police activity—brought about by beckert’s killings—thwarts the city’s criminal activity. in laying down this groundwork, lang sets up a strange sort of hierarchy wherein the police hold power over the criminals and the criminals hold power over beckert. they resort to a dangerous kind of absolution in the end, which 14 benjamin, “the work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction,” p. 1181. figure 5 figure 6 26 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college badiou vehemently warns against when writing on nazi ideology. he disapproves of those who simply consider nazism unthinkably evil, since this inability to acknowledge ideology (or interiority) often results in even more violence and horror. badiou explains: “to maintain that nazism is not a form of thought, or, more generally, that barbarism does not think, is to abet a process of surreptitious absolution.”15 we see this surreptitious absolution in the sheer cruelty of the criminals and other residents of berlin who put beckert on trial, and who laugh and jeer at the killer as he begs for his life. in a strange way, lang’s directorial method asks us to consider this killer’s thought—that is, to assume a basic sort of interiority. badiou writes of wanting to know how the century thinks of itself, and lang’s film almost seems to want to achieve the same thing. m not only thinks about the century, but it also goes further to criticize it in the midst of its happening. the “surreptitious absolution” taken up by the residents of berlin represents how ideology becomes collective, and, evidently, political. in m, passion for the real is addressed and brought to life by groups of smarmy men in smoke-filled rooms: the crime bosses, and also the police chiefs (see figure 7). ideology, under the guise of politics, forms amidst the few before it is promulgated to the masses. the central dichotomy, that between the thinking, ideologically protected residents and the barbarous beckert, is achieved through this absolution and enforced by the simple, undeniable fact that politics thinks itself just. a lone killer cannot have an ideology—or any sort of interiority—whereby a group of likeminded residents must be justified in their thinking since there are so many of them. badiou confirms this very suspicion: “politics, when it exists, grounds its own principle regarding the real, and is thus in need of nothing, save itself.”16 evidently, passion for the real acts both as a justification for a genuinely barbarous ideology, and as a way to self-legitimatize that which wields power. politics is self-serving, and this point is made explicit by the fact that those condemning beckert are, themselves, criminals too! this propensity of politics to “save itself ” calls to mind giorgio agamben’s theory of ‘bare life,’ whereby a sovereign-power must exclude—deem worthless—some other form of life in order to maintain its own hegemony: “[the] living being who, though being human, is excluded–and through this exclusion, included–in humanity, so that human beings can have a human life, which is to say a political life.”17 though, it’s unclear if agamben’s exclusive inclusivity of the sovereign-power/bare-life dichotomy requires bare-life to exist. is beckert ‘bare life’ if he is to be killed? even in death, does he live on as an emblem of the agambenian homo sacer for the politically minded residents of berlin? history mournfully reminds us that many of these same germans would find a new form of ‘sovereign power’ in the decade to follow. either way, in 15 badiou, 4. 16 ibid., p. 6. 17 agamben, giorgio. the use of bodies. edited by werner hamacher. translated by adam kotsko, stanford university press, 2016, p. 23. 27issue vi ◆ spring 2019 the horror of the real attempting to synthesize agambenian and badiousian theory, looking at lang’s film through the lens of both, i extrapolate a few notable points. first, i argue that this passion for the real is a justification—a kind of moral imperative—for agambenian ‘bare life.’ we can also determine that the specifics of ‘bare life’ as described by agamben, life whose biological existence is considered worthless, applies to badiou’s thoughts on politics. do all politics and ideologies subsist on rendering the other as homo sacer? badiou surely overlooked m because its expressionist sensibility flies in the face of the ‘art of subtraction’ that he champions in the century. and while his points on subtraction (the art of auto-interrogation) are made clear in the text, there remains something to be said about more mainstream art that still manages to interrogate these aspects of society. the closest m gets to modernism is in its jagged construction, which comes from its constantly shifting perspective, oscillating from the crime bosses, to the beggars, to beckert, to the police, and back again. take that as you may, but there is something tragic about the fact that lang’s film was widely seen—largely championed—and yet, failed to make the country of its origin aware of its demons. if badiou is correct in postulating that passion for the real manifests in the disjunctive synthesis between art and violence, than m proves, more than anything else, that this violence may overpower its artistic correlate. ◆ figure 7 28 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college bibliography agamben, giorgio. the use of bodies. edited by werner hamacher. translated by adam kotsko, stanford university press, 2016. badiou, alain. the century. translated by alberto toscano, polity, 2008. benjamin, walter. “the work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction.” the norton anthology of theory and criticism, edited by vincent b. leitch, w. w. norton & company, inc., 2001, pp. 1166–1186. lang, fritz, director. m. nero-film a-g, 1931. 29issue vi ◆ spring 2019 δι αν οι α phenomenological reproduction in thompson and mailer's new journalism brendan chambers “the truth is no more nor no less than what one feels at each instant in the perpetual climax of the present.” – norman mailer, “the white negro” in his classic essay, “the new journalism and the image-world: two modes of organizing experience,” david eason sought to distance interpretations of new journalism from what he saw as the facile, superficial description of its resemblance to novelistic writing, and to create a more complex conception of the relationship between style, culture, and consciousness. he argued that the widespread view of new journalism as literary journalism (particularly as propounded by tom wolfe) “abstracts the reports from their cultural contexts [… giving] only passing attention to the experiential contradictions represented in many of the reports.”1 within his own formulation, eason proposed instead that we think of two countervailing subdivisions within this body of work, each reflecting a different approach to conceptualizing the relationship of reporter to the cultural fragmentation of the 1960’s and 1970’s. in so doing, eason established categories that influence critical discussion to this day.2 eason called the first of these approaches “ethnographic realism.”3 this mode aims to enter a group and “constitute the subculture as an object of display,” from whence “the reporter and reader, whose values are assumed and not explored, are conjoined 1 eason, david l. “the new journalism and the image-world: two modes of organizing experience” in critical studies in mass communication (1984), 52. 2 for instance, robert alexander’s analysis of thompson’s fear and loathing in las vegas’ role in the history of narrative journalism, or norman k. denzin’s work describing performance ethnography. 3 eason, “the new journalism and the image-world: two modes of organizing experience,” 51. 30 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college in the act of observing,” work “to reinvent textually the consensus which cultural fragmentation had called into question.”4 this approach, exemplified by the work of tom wolfe, effectively places the reporter and his reader outside of a given event (or cultural moment, as eason was more wont to describe it), and in the passive role of bystander, observing without participating. by unifying them in this role, the text positions both reader and reporter within a shared culture and value system, often appropriating obsolete codes of understanding to do so. scenes and subcultures are made accessible to the reader only by depicting him in relation to the (assumed) shared dominant cultural framework. positioned in that way, the journalist then penetrates the world of the other, affording the reader with a passage into its hidden reality. in eason’s view, ethnographic realism, at its core, largely sought to assuage the fears of mainstream audiences about the fracturing of society by comparing what appeared to be new and frightening cultural changes to supposedly similar movements of the past: in wolfe’s case, for instance, linking the worryingly impenetrable symbolic world of ken kesey’s ‘merry pranksters’ to the base human religious impulse. to eason, this explanatory role also disguised an unequal power dynamic between reporter and reader. though they are unified in the assumed shared cultural understanding, writer and reader are often simultaneously placed on uneven ground, with the reporter in a paternal role, guiding the reader from ignorance to understanding.5 eason terms his second variant of new journalism—the one that will interest me in the following pages— “cultural phenomenology.” this approach takes in some ways an entirely opposite angle in addressing cultural fragmentation. it not only acknowledges, but also embraces the mindset that “there is no consensus about a frame of reference to explain ‘what it all means.’”6 it equivocates on calling any one experience “reality,” instead sitting with the “experiential contradictions represented in many of the reports.”7 finally, it joins together reporter and reader in the co-creation of a reality, engaging in a “multi-level interrogation, including that between writer and reader.”8 in contrast to ethnographic realism, this collaborative construction by reader and author puts both on a more equal footing, reflecting the cultural values of the time period that produced it. while ethnographic realism can exist at any time, cultural phenomenology is representative of a specific cultural moment; it is a manifestation and product of the 1960’s and early 1970’s, a time when “the doctrine of representation had crumpled [and] the center which separated image and reality were not holding.”9 each approach reflects a methodology of understanding, a means to the end of reckoning with an unrecognizable world. 4 ibid., 52. 5 ibid., 54. 6 ibid., 52. 7 ibid., 52. 8 ibid., 52. 9 ibid., 51. 31issue vi ◆ spring 2019 phenomenological reproduction as eason suggests, the divergent means of “coming to terms with disorder” in the rapidly changing media world are reflected in the meta-analyses that crop up in each style.10 as mas’ud zavarzadeh explains in his mythopoeic reality, given the expansion and diversification of mainstream news media in the 1960s, readers grew to be wary of any text that sought to totalize experience, which presented a singular, universal understanding of events, as both traditional literature and reportage had. in zavarzadeh’s telling, they began to eschew anything that presented a single, solid “harmonizing principle behind manifold reality.”11 instead, readers often sought what new journalism offers: a self-conscious, self-aware approach to representation, which recognizes the limitations of individual experience and makes explicit reference to them, so as to most accurately present information to the reader. more traditional forms of ethnographic realism attempted to keep pace with these changes, though it often left little room for the reader to decide whether the journalist’s representation was accurate, taking that truth-claim as a given. ethnographic realism often creates the illusion that the processes of its creation could produce nothing other than an objective representation of reality, despite the sculpting necessarily done by matters of selection, point of view, and so on. i see eason’s conception of cultural phenomenology as the opposing approach, calling attention to the inherent limitations of its form and method. it is not only cognizant of these limitations, but it also makes use of them in order to investigate, in conjunction with the reader, the possibilities available to construct a world “rooted in the interaction of ‘images of reality’ and ‘the reality of images.’”12 if asked to distill the distinction between the two styles to a single phrase, i nominate authorial self-reflexivity. cultural phenomenology recognizes the existence and effects of this liminal image-world13 on writing itself and any attempts, therefore, to represent such a world. by taking stock of the contemporary cultural moment, and the effects of the proliferation and dissemination of media, writers using a culturalphenomenological approach are careful to track the effects that the image-world have on their own actions and the events that they attempt to report. this reciprocity within eason’s second model—which is quite similar, as he acknowledges, to what zavarzadeh terms a “testimonial” approach to nonfiction novel writing—even shapes the decisions of the journalist as he is writing.14 if, for example, norman mailer changes his behavior to conform to, or to challenge, the constructed media image of norman mailer, then that image influences his account of “the real.” in this way, the author serves as a vehicle to represent our new lives simultaneously in the world, and 10 ibid., 54. 11 zavarzadeh, mas'ud. the mythopoeic reality: the postwar american nonfiction novel. (university of illinois press, 1976) 12 eason ““the new journalism and the image-world: two modes of organizing experience,” 55. 13 for the purposes of this paper, the image-world is “a realm which blurs the distinctions between fantasy and reality,” one which challenges the traditional dichotomy of image and real, instead imagining “a world in which image and reality are ecologically intertwined” (eason 54, 53). in practice, this is the conception of reality, formed through the consumption of media and experience, which exists in the collective consciousness of society. 14 zavarzadeh, the mythopoeic reality: the postwar american nonfiction novel, 128. 32 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college outside of it, in the image-world. the distinction between the two—to this historical point well-established—has, in response to reality’s conceptual fragmentation, become blurred. understandings of reality influence understandings of the self; thus, the self must now be understood to be similarly fractured, or lost in the liminal space that our “technotronic society” has opened between the image and the real.15 i will now examine how eason’s phenomenological method and zevarzadeh’s testimonial approach16 are manifested in the works of hunter s. thompson and norman mailer. i will examine how thompson’s fear and loathing in las vegas and mailer’s armies of the night conform to—and/or complicate—the categories that eason postulates. i am interested in the reciprocal manipulation of artistic practice and public image in both writers, as well as the relation of that manipulation to each authors’ claims regarding epistemological authority. additionally, i will explore both authors’ use of writing as a reconstitution of self, using the lens of eason’s conception of cultural fragmentation as a point of departure. this question is critical to reckoning with the full scope of their works, as the centrality of self is an inherent characteristic of subjective reportage. hunter s. thompson’s fear and loathing in las vegas embodies eason’s description of cultural phenomenology as a “symbolic quest for significance in a fragmenting society.”17 las vegas’s image-world increasingly fractures the supposed object of his quest—an “american dream” now irreparably divided into bike racers at the mint 400, the police at the national conference of district attorneys, or the various outcasts and addicts who populate the city’s casinos and fringe—making the search for concrete, universal truth increasingly more suspect and improbable. the actual quest thus becomes thompson’s own struggle—and, at times, a fruitless quest—to establish new avenues for epistemological authority by constantly shifting stylistic modes and journalistic strategies. thompson’s “savage dream” both exposes and displays the inconsistencies inherent in his own storytelling so as to construct more truthfully a new, fragile and even “failed” reality with his reader.18 it is impossible to say definitively whether thompson intended the process for this work as a rhetorical strategy, that is to say, understood the impossibility of finding a universal framework through which to unify his subjects. but what is certain—or, at least, what most critics believe19—is that thompson embraces this disunity, working to document “what it feels like to live in a world in which there is no consensus about 15 zavarzadeh, 1. 16 the testimonial nonfiction novel, as zavarzadeh terms it, “assumes that the only authority on appearance and existence is the witness himself.” in other words, that the author’s epistemological authority derives from presence at an event, and that the only information that can be conveyed with absolute authority is that which was registered by “one’s participating senses” (128). 17 eason, “the new journalism and the image-world: two modes of organizing experience,” 52. 18 in his “jacket copy to fear and loathing to las vegas: a savage journey into the heart of the american dream,” thompson describes the work as a “failed experiment in gonzo journalism.” 19 see, for instance, hollowell, john. fact & fiction: the new journalism and the nonfiction novel. (university of north carolina press, 1977), 11. 33issue vi ◆ spring 2019 phenomenological reproduction a frame of reference to explain ‘what it all means.’”20;21 because of this, he makes forays into a variety of avenues for authority, seeking a method of communication that can convey experience. thus on a diegetic and conceptual level, fear and loathing in las vegas serves simultaneously as a representation of the new “supramodern” world and as a documentation of thompson’s attempts at recording it.22 thompson’s ultimate task, of course, is to establish the disunity of american society in the ’60s and ’70s and to articulate the absence of a unifying cultural framework (represented in fllv by the american dream). after eating at terry’s taco stand, near the end of their ostensible quest, duke and gonzo reach what is left of the club they think is called the american dream, finding only “a huge slab of cracked, scorched concrete in a vacant lot full of weeds,” and are informed that “the place had ‘burned down about three years ago,’” leaving little interpretation necessary for the reader.23 it is not by accident that thompson chose las vegas as the backdrop for this tale of fragmentation. the city is the preeminent example of what eason calls “the marketing of worlds of experience,” and, therefore, is the ideal place to bring into question “the relativity of all worlds, including one’s own.”24 las vegas is also a perfect example of the bidirectional influence of the image-world, where “image and reality are ecologically intertwined.”25 full of neon lights, unsavory spectacles, and uninhibited hedonism, las vegas is the “vortex” of the american dream, a grotesque paradise and a world of its own.26 these excesses of las vegas of course influence its image, but to the same degree the collective perception of the city as a haven for vice and excess forces it to cater to this conception, the reality thus changing to conform to the image. the same transformative process occurs through thompson’s strategy of internalizing the image-world into a distorted caricature of his own identity. raoul duke is famously a rum-guzzling, drug-frenzied maniac: the “gonzo” journalist. even thompson’s so-called “biographies” document a self that has morphed into that gonzo identity, as thompson and his constructed image became inseparable.27 20 fear and loathing in las vegas was originally serialized in two parts in rolling stone magazine in 1971 and 1972. as thompson describes it, he intended to travel to las vegas and cover the mint 400, “to buy a fat notebook and record the whole thing, as it happened, then send in the notebook for publication—without editing.” instead, he laid the foundation for the work during “about 36 straight hours in [his] room at the mint hotel…writing feverishly in a notebook about a nasty situation that i thought i might not get away from” which was then compiled over the next six months at the behest of his editor, and put into print later that year. 21 eason, “the new journalism and the image-world: two modes of organizing experience,” 52. 22 zavarzadeh, the mythopoeic reality: the postwar american nonfiction novel, 1. 23 thompson, hunter s. fear and loathing in las vegas: a savage journey into the heart of the american dream. (random house, 1998), 168. 24 eason, “the new journalism and the image-world: two modes of organizing experience,” 51. 25 ibid., 53. 26 thompson, fear and loathing in las vegas: a savage journey into the heart of the american dream, 47 27 the biography written by e. jean carroll, for example, opens with a schedule of thompson’s daily drug use, beginning: 3:00 p.m. rise 3:05 chivas regal with the morning papers, dunhills 3:45 cocaine 34 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college this image is constructed to a strategic end, however. by suffusing his writing with alternating mania and introspection, thompson places himself in the tradition of the blind prophet, a strategy that stretches back to tiresias, one who ostensibly cannot see, but who, in fact, “sees” better than most. visionary hallucinations afford the opportunity to place the symbolic in the real without straying too far into the realm of the fictional: a hotel lounge full of humanoid lizards cannibalizing one another stand as a report of thompson’s true lived experience, while simultaneously representing an allegorical understanding of las vegas’ patrons. in thompson’s visionary brand of new journalism, therefore, individual experience remains the highest source of epistemological authority, even as its hallucinatory style testifies to the author’s refusal to attempt a supposedly “objective” representation of reality. he eschews presenting a “harmonizing principle behind manifold reality,” instead working constantly to remind the reader of the constructedness of the very identity that bears witness to a surreal narrative.28 throughout fear and loathing, for example, thompson inserts small tags that allude to his process of creating the story, but they are themselves documents of immersion, chaos, haste and disorder: they are the notes from which he constructs his account, scribbled on “a pocketful of keno cards and cocktail napkins,” or on the handful of ink splotches splattered throughout the text, as if the pages the reader holds were torn straight from thompson’s handwritten journal.29 likewise, he includes qualifiers such as “as i recall” and “memories of this night are extremely hazy,” so as to be candid with readers about his state of perception in a way that both qualifies and authenticates his report.30 perhaps the most revealing moment is the one in which fear and loathing claims to offer the rendering of an event from thompson’s own notebook, sans edits; the section entitled “breakdown on paradise boulevard” is presented as simply the transcript of the conversation between duke and gonzo. the editor’s note, which heads the section, states: at this point in the chronology, dr. duke appears to have broken down completely; the original manuscript is so splintered that we were forced to seek out the original tape recording and transcribe it verbatim. we made no attempt to edit the section, and dr. duke refused even to read it […] in 3:50 another glass of chivas, dunhill 4:05 first cup of coffee, dunhill 4:15 cocaine 4:16 orange juice, dunhill 4:30 cocaine 4:54 cocaine 5:05 cocaine 28 zavarzadeh, the mythopoeic reality: the postwar american nonfiction novel, 8. 29 thompson, fear and loathing in las vegas: a savage journey into the heart of the american dream, 41. 30 thompson, 37, 41. 35issue vi ◆ spring 2019 phenomenological reproduction the interests of journalistic purity, we are publishing the following section just as it came off the tape.31 in this section, we might say, thompson operates somewhere between zavarzadeh’s testimonial and notational modes, complicating their distinction in his process of searching for avenues to authority. while the testimonial mode, zavarzedeh writes, derives epistemological authority from presence during an event, the notational mode typically does so through the direct, unedited nature of the work, where the author serves only to record the event verbatim for the reader and to reproduce it exactly. thompson intended fear and loathing to toe the line between the two. he sees “the eye & mind of the journalist […] functioning as a camera,” and wants the material to be unedited once recorded, but also recognizes that “the writing would be selective & necessarily interpretive,” since it is filtered through the lens of the author’s experience.32 the above section exemplifies thompson’s operation in this liminal space: it is supposedly a direct recording of the events as they occurred, transcribed from “the original tape recording,” but given that it exists in a work that makes editorial decisions in other sections means, by necessity, that its inclusion is an editorial decision. in this way, thompson operates in both modes simultaneously, notationally including verbatim recordings while testimonially shaping the narrative through decisions that most accurately represent his subjective experience. though thompson writes off this moment by judging the work “a victim of its own conceptual schizophrenia,” he tempers his own dismissal with a coda, claiming it as “a first, gimped effort in a direction that tom wolfe calls ‘the new journalism’ has been flirting with for almost a decade.”33 perhaps most importantly, these moments of narrative discontinuity—from reminders of narrative construction to sudden style changes—execute a sort of brechtian fourth-wall break, bringing readers out of an essentially immersive narrative and forcing them to evaluate their active participation in a more distanced, critical way. through this, such readers are inoculated against taking the work as representative of the world, but rather shown that it is a world in a multitude of worlds. in eason’s formulation, thompson invites the reader to engage in a “multi-layered interrogation of communication […] between the writer and the reader, as a way of constructing reality.”34 readers are empowered to reconstitute their own understanding of the reality presented to them—given the ostensibly unqualified facts of the experience and its conveyance—and thereby accept or reject its truth. norman mailer was as, if not more, aware than thompson of the image-world, and has worked to complicate, engage, and interrogate traditional modes of representation. the first page of armies of the night opens with a selection from time portraying 31 ibid., 120. 32 ibid., 120. 33 thompson, hunter s. the great shark hunt: strange tales from a strange time. (picador, 2012), 123, 122. 34 eason, “the new journalism and the image-world: two modes of organizing experience,” 52. 36 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college him as an uncontrolled drunk, “slurping liquor from a coffee mug” and expounding upon the lack of bathroom facilities in the theater where he is speaking.35 but just as for thompson, mailer’s constructed image is part contrivance in the moment (a construct next to the liberal but respectable robert lowell) and partly the result of a retrospective literary self-fashioning, as john hollowell sees it, into “a kind of psychic president, a moral leader” for the contemporary cultural moment.36 he is “semi-distinguished and semi-notorious,” “the modern everyday fellow,” and “the wild man.”37 by crafting a complex, dipolar, and at times paradoxical self-caricature, he can implicitly criticize the media processes that would claim singular objective construction of his image while only selectively including observations from the event. in armies of the night, mailer operates in two distinct modes: novelist and historian. as novelist, mailer performs two roles. first, the novelist documents reality as it happened to him; he is, in mailer’s words, the “narrative vehicle for the march on the pentagon.”38 however, this experiential record is not entirely forthright or trustworthy. of course, it includes retrospective revisions, as memory, especially since one apparently so often drunk as mailer cannot be trusted to be entirely faithful to original perception. this leads to the second role of the novelist, which is to construct as truthful an image of mailer as possible, by which the reader can correct the effects of his biases on the narrative. in this way, the image of the novelist is a tool, an “instrument to view our facts and conceivably study them in that field of light” that his construction of mailer has produced.39 having established this critical lens, as historian, mailer seeks to accurately “elucidate the mysterious character of that quintessentially american event,” the march on the pentagon.40 in this way, armies of the night serves both as an implicit treatise on behalf of the new journalism and as an explicit criticism of the old, demonstrating mailer’s belief that reporting “intensity and wholeness of perceptions more closely approaches the truth, or the most important truth, of the thing perceived than objective reporting.”41 by choosing an event whose literal occurrence maps onto his view of the vietnam war, mailer creates, as john hollowell describes it in his fact and fiction, an “impressionistic history as seen through the lens of participant-observer.”42 mailer presents the two sides of the literal-figurative war through a series of representative images, relying on connotative understandings to bolster his depictions: “healthy marines, state troopers, professional athletes, movie stars, rednecks, sensuous life35 mailer, norman. the armies of the night: history as a novel, the novel as history. (plume, 2017), 3. 36 hollowell, fact & fiction: the new journalism and the nonfiction novel, 39. 37 mailer, the armies of the night: history as a novel, the novel as history, 13, 15. 38 ibid., 54. 39 ibid., 216. 40 ibid. 41 begiebing, robert j. acts of regeneration: allegory and archetype in the works of norman mailer. (university of missouri press, 1980), 135. 42 hollowell, fact & fiction: the new journalism and the nonfiction novel, 90. 37issue vi ◆ spring 2019 phenomenological reproduction loving mafia, cops [etc.] arrayed against…the freud-ridden embers of marxism, good old american anxiety strata—the urban middle class with their proliferated monumental adenoidal resentments.”43 rather than maintaining a strict focus on the events that he is reporting on, mailer often chooses instead to move into exegetical commentary. in this way, like thompson, he complicates zavarzadeh’s categories of ‘nonfiction novel,’ using them as shifting modes of representation. though mailer seems to operate in the testimonial mode, absorbing and regurgitating events as “witness-participant-narrator,” just so often, he shifts to “a private interpretive scheme to reorder the seemingly random incidents into […] ‘a significant form.’” this is more in line with zavarzadeh’s exegetical mode44, as, for instance, when mailer moves from a debate with lowell and macdonald about the relative merits of being arrested, to an encompassing diatribe on the history of ideological changes of the left over the course of a paragraph.45 in the testimonial mode, he operates as novelist: a vehicle for experience. in the exegetical mode, he is historian, providing interpretive commentary tempered by the reader’s use of his constructed image. diversions characterize mailer’s work; he is even willing to concede the inaccuracy of his perceptions, recording his experience with inconsistencies included. at the height of the march’s frenzy, for example, mailer notes that despite the literal erroneousness of his perception, he experienced a “superimposition of vision,” seeing real men fleeing and carrying an n.l.f. flag chased by phantom mp’s and policemen.46 though he experienced that vision, he also acknowledges that his perception ran contrary to what other participants reported. in this way, he implicitly acknowledges eason’s premise that phenomenological works are a representation of a world among worlds, each bearing the weight of epistemological authority over itself, but no other.47 perhaps the most distinctive element of mailer’s craft is the voice through which he expresses his ideas. in armies, he creates the feel of a novel by having an unnamed narrator describe the events that occur to mailer (of course, the author) as character. in this way, mailer is able to split his presence and voice, paradoxically laying claim to both omniscience and subjectivity. mailer the writer is omniscient because of his unfettered access to the thoughts and motivations of mailer the character. however, he also simultaneously claims epistemological authority through documentation of his subjective experience of the event. clearly, this technique seems to transcend both eason’s categories as well as zavarzadeh’s. though eason asserts that mailer is operating in the phenomenological mode, third person narration typically creates a voice that mediates experience between recorder and consumer, and thus falls more neatly under the umbrella of ethnographic realism. mailer wants his narrator to be “an eyewitness who is a participant but not a vested partisan,” and indeed often 43 mailer, the armies of the night: history as a novel, the novel as history, 34. 44 zavarzadeh, the mythopoeic reality: the postwar american nonfiction novel, 129, 93. 45 mailer, the armies of the night: history as a novel, the novel as history, 85. 46 ibid., 127. 47 eason, “the new journalism and the image-world: two modes of organizing experience,” 51. 38 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college maintains a strong commitment to unfiltered communication of the experience. in other moments, however, he does interpretive work for his readers, presenting them with a rather clean, uncomplicated understanding of events’ relationship and meaning.48 in this way, mailer actually sits in a more intermediate space between phenomenology and ethnography, as well as between testimony and exegesis, since he is both the active communicator of participatory experience and passive commenter on the significance of events. mailer in fact comments on this tension explicitly, explaining that the central figure of his story must, by necessity, be ambiguous, “to recapture the precise feel of the ambiguity of the event and its monumental disproportions.”49 a telling example of mailer’s complication of traditional media’s objectivity in armies is his account of the evening at the ambassador theater. whereas time portrays mailer “stumbling” about the auditorium, incoherently spewing a “scatological solo,” the novel delves into mailer’s reactions to his audience, and the power struggles between the authors on the stage, which would have been invisible to anyone not participating in them. by placing his retrospective account in conversation with time, a proxy for supposedly trustworthy news coverage, mailer positions himself as the epistemological authority on this event. from the opening pages of the work, mailer is playing with twin conceptions of “time,” both in its manifestation as representative of traditional news media as a whole, and in its distorting effects of retrospection on storytelling. the novel is framed as an attempt to supersede both of these impediments to understanding, working to “leave time in order to find out what happened.”50 with his intimate knowledge of what occurred, and, more importantly, his very dispensing with a claim to objectivity, he invites readers to place their trust in the authority of his experience, placing (as mailer writes) “adjectives” and especially “adverbs” (that is, qualifications of perception) beyond the authority of traditional reporting.51 collaterally, he is then well-positioned to expound his own views. unlike thompson, for whom creation of image is not the stated aim, but a byproduct of his writing, mailer presents himself as setting out with the explicit intention of recreating himself in the image-world in the first half of the work, so as to provide the reader with a metric against which they can measure his report in the second half. through what he alerts readers to—“our intimacy with the master builder” of the narrative itself—the reader can account for whatever limits they perceive in mailer’s own ability to report accurately.52 during the early stages of the march, for example, lowell and mailer arrive to the sound of music, which the author initially notes “was being played by the fugs,” but which mailer quickly qualifies (being “scrupulously phenomenological”). 48 mailer, the armies of the night: history as a novel, the novel as history, 53. 49 ibid., 53. 50 ibid., 4. 51 ibid., 282. 52 ibid., 218. 39issue vi ◆ spring 2019 phenomenological reproduction as per usual, mailer places himself in the third person: “mailer heard the music first, then noticed the musicians and their costumes, then recognized […] it was the fugs.”53 by comically highlighting the issue of phenomenology, mailer demonstrates an awareness of the audience’s concerns, and preempts their questions before they even have them. thompson and mailer thus adopt somewhat divergent strategies. by grounding himself in the first-person, thompson plays on the epistemological authority of experience to give weight to his account; he then crafts his argument through the symbolic representations that largely appear through hallucination. mailer, on the other hand, constructs his argument through a multifaceted approach to documentation, which addresses the weaknesses of both subjective and objective reporting so as to craft the truest retelling possible. “the history as novel” contains both the strengths and weaknesses of subjectivity, strong in its documentation of the “history of himself ”—the story of an individual experience—and yet, it is weak in its necessarily limited scope.54 “the novel as history” is in turn the embodiment of objectivity, with strength in its far-reaching account of events, and weakness in its necessarily biased universalization. as begeibing comments in his acts of regeneration, mailer responds to traditional objective journalism by “fusing the personal truths of the experience with the events themselves” and sits with the understanding that “neither kind of truth is exclusive to either book.”55 by operating in both modes, mailer is able to account for the flaws of both the novelist and the historian, using the strengths of each to balance out the weaknesses of the other. the central event in armies of the night, the march on the pentagon, exemplifies mailer’s skill at hewing metaphorical meaning from literal events. he considers the purpose of the march itself “to wound [the pentagon] symbolically,” extending the ideas that he had developed as far back as “the white negro.”56 in that essay, he suggested that hipsters, who (as he saw it) in armies make up the shock troops of the march, seek to live not within the world, but outside of it, in a life and reality of their own creation. they interact with the world through energy and vibrations, where every interaction ends in either an increase or decrease in the energy that one possesses, and thus one’s ability to perceive the world. mailer sketches the mindset of the marchers in the same terms, as they seek not military victory, but instead “new kinds of victories [that] increase one’s power for new kinds of perception.”57 through this language of perception and energy, mailer is able to construct a retelling of the event, which operates simultaneously on the literal and figurative level. he re-forms the march into symbolic civil war while simultaneously portraying the reality of what occurred. 53 ibid., 119. 54 ibid., 215. 55 begeibing, acts of regeneration: allegory and archetype in the works of norman mailer, 141. 56 mailer, norman. advertisements for myself. (penguin books, 2018), 54 57 mailer, 76. 40 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college upon arrival at this climactic scene, the first detail that mailer notes is the chaotic mix of cymbals, chanting, and spoken word played by the fugs. throughout the beginning of the pentagon episode, much of mailer’s attention is focused on the fugs’ role in the yuppie army’s attempt to raise the pentagon “three hundred feet,” where it would then “turn orange and vibrate until all evil emissions had fled this levitation.”58 through his description of their production, mailer implicitly draws a parallel between the intention of the fugs’s artistic performance and his own: the exorcism would proceed, and the fugs were to serve as a theatrical medium…while the indian triangle and the cymbal sounded, while a trumpet offered a mournful subterranean wail, full of sobs, and mahogany shadows of sorrow, and all sour groans from hell’s dungeon, while finger bells tinkled and drums beat, so did [ed sanders, lead vocalist of the fugs’] solemn voice speak something approximate to this.59 mailer then goes on to describe sanders’ extended meditation on the evils of the war in vietnam. here, in their role as “theatrical medium” the fugs act as both representative of, and conduit for, experience, as their music simultaneously reflects and feeds the energy of the crowd. meanwhile, mailer does the same, recording the event while he participates in it, chanting along with the crowd. he describes a paper passed around in the terms of mutual co-construction of experience: “by the act of reading this paper, you are engaged in the holy exorcism,” a collective understanding of what the event is and yet also how a common vision means to transform it.60 at the same time, the phenomenological information that mailer conveys is permeated by a tone that matches the strangely serious and absurd approach of the protest itself. while the fugs chant about the pentagon’s first grope-in for peace, for instance, mailer finds himself musing about how his “three divorces and four wives” have forced him to concede “the absolute existence of witches.”61 though the protest of the pentagon is deeply serious—addressing, after all, the horrors of war in general and the vietnam war in particular—neither mailer nor his yippie shock troops can seem to broach the subject without a bent towards the ridiculous, or even the irreverent. thus, by jumping back and forth between documentary and experiential modes, from straining “to see what was going on at the head of the column,” over to the fugs playing “out, demons, out!” to the people “streaming […] to see what the attack had developed,” mailer mimics the head-turning hysteria of the march.62 yet, as mailer’s participation in the event comes to its conclusion, his narration snaps back into the novelist’s sharp focus on minute detail and reader-absorption. after 58 mailer, the armies of the night: history as a novel, the novel as history, 120. 59 ibid., 120-121. 60 ibid., 121. 61 ibid., 122, 123. 62 ibid., 126. 41issue vi ◆ spring 2019 phenomenological reproduction stepping past the rope meant to separate the marchers from the pentagon, what occurs next is illustrated in stark relief, and in a coherent, logical order: the mp’s stood in two widely spaced ranks. the first rank was ten yards behind the rope, and each mp in that row was close to twenty feet from the next man. the second rank, similarly spaced, was ten yards behind the first rank and perhaps thirty yards behind them a cluster appeared, every fifty yards or so, of two or three u. s. marshals in white helmets and dark blue suits…he made a point of stepping neatly and decisively over the low rope. then he headed across the grass to the nearest mp he saw. it was as if the air had changed, or the light had altered; he felt immediately much more alive—yes, bathed in air—and yet disembodied from himself, as if indeed he were watching himself in a film where this action was taking place. he could feel the eyes of the people behind the rope watching him, could feel the intensity of their existence as spectators.63 mailer takes time to describe the smallest details, from his augmented perception of the light, to his feeling of being watched, to the “naked stricken lucidity” of the military police as he strides towards them.64 he also returns to an extended meditation, making attempts at recreating the interiority of the mp in front of him, wondering whether he quivered from a “desire to strike [mailer], or secret military wonder […] now possessed of a moral force which implanted terror in the arms of young soldiers.”65 throughout this sequence, he refers back to the air quality, calling it “mountain air,” though washington sits firmly near sea level. he ceases referring to it as such only when he is finally brought away from the crowd and is placed out of view.66 in doing so, mailer sets apart those moments at which his image is being created—when he is on display—not only for the people present, but also for those who will watch the bbc footage later on. mailer writes of having felt—in a variation on thompson’s claim, quoted earlier—at once “more alive […] and yet disembodied from himself, as if indeed he were watching himself in a film where this action was taking place.”67 mailer paints himself as aware, in the moment of experience, of the simultaneity of the real and the image. he feels that his actions were being recorded, whether on video or in memory, shaping his conception in the public consciousness. though eason’s separation of ethnographic realism and cultural phenomenology offers a critically important approach to new journalism, thompson and mailer both illustrate that the distinction is not as dichotomous as eason might suggest. for thompson, representation of reality is not consistently an active, co-constructive act in conjunction for the reader, as eason’s categorization of thompson as cultural phenomenologist might suggest. though thompson often qualifies the faithfulness 63 ibid., 129-130. 64 ibid., 130. 65 ibid. 66 ibid., 130, 138. 67 ibid., 129. (emphasis mine) 42 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college of his account in “breakdown on paradise boulevard,” he presents the report to the reader as patently representative of what occurred, taken “verbatim” for the sake of “journalistic purity.”68 this sort of ostensible straightforwardness strays toward the realm of ethnographic realism in that it assumes a shared perception with the reader, namely that verbatim recordings are a “purer” representation of reality than memory or perceptual experience. however, the section also has elements of cultural phenomenology: it cedes the fragmentary nature of reality (indeed, the manuscript is “splintered,” acknowledging the inability to communicate that perceptual experience). these sorts of paradoxical, intermediate moments expose the weaknesses of eason’s categories. though they are at times not as strictly separate as one might wish, they still prove useful in the framework that they provide to describe the reciprocal interaction of the image-world and reality in these pieces, and how thompson and mailer’s understanding of that relationship shapes their reconstruction of self. in spite of the fact that the world appears irreparably fractured, into brutish factions that populate washington and las vegas, mailer and thompson both use the imageworld as a tool to construct a more stable, cohesive self. the march, for mailer, is an almost incommunicably chaotic event; however, by placing himself at the center of it in his retelling, he builds an image of norman mailer which, though at times confusing and complex, is nonetheless solid. this reconstitution of the self comes as a result of the interplay of reality, in his actions, and the image-world, in his book and other representations. by this self-reflexive recreation, he puts forth an addendum to eason’s categories, whereby the journalist is able both to penetrate the image to reveal the reality (for example in his rebuttal of the time depiction) and to understand the implication and mutualistic relationship of the image on reality, and vice versa. through these complications, we see how each journalist simultaneously supports and undermines eason’s distinctions. by bringing each category into question, and the two into conversation with one another, we can then most fully explore these modes of representation. ◆ 68 thompson, fear and loathing in las vegas: a savage journey into the heart of the american dream, 161. 43issue vi ◆ spring 2019 phenomenological reproduction bibliography begiebing, robert j. acts of regeneration: allegory and archetype in the works of norman mailer. columbia: university of missouri press, 1980. eason, david l. “the new journalism and the image-world: two modes of organizing experience.” in critical studies in mass communication, 1984. hollowell, john. fact & fiction: the new journalism and the nonfiction novel. chapel hill: university of north carolina press, 1977. mailer, norman. the armies of the night: history as a novel, the novel as history. plume, 2017. mailer, norman. advertisements for myself. london: penguin books, 2018. thompson, hunter s. fear and loathing in las vegas: a savage journey into the heart of the american dream. new york: random house, 1998. thompson, hunter s. the great shark hunt: strange tales from a strange time. london: picador, 2012. zavarzadeh, mas'ud. the mythopoeic reality: the postwar american nonfiction novel. champaign: university of illinois press, 1976. 44 δι αν οι α cognition, domination and complexity: a speculative outline of intersections between cognitive activity and structures of control, and their relation to dynamics of complexity and simplicity ryan cardoza “organization is suppression.” 1 “life is founded upon the premise of a belief in enduring and regularly recurring things; the more powerful life is, the wider must be the knowable world to which we, as it were, attribute being.” 2 “morality of truthfulness in the herd. ‘you shall be knowable, express your inner nature by clear and constant signs—otherwise you are dangerous: and if you are evil, your ability to dissimulate is the worst thing for the herd. we despise the secret and unrecognizable.—’” 3 1 land, nick, interview by james flint. organization is suppression (february 1997) 2 nietzsche, friedrich. "will to power." in will to power, by friedrich nietzsche, 298. new york: random house inc., 1968. 3 nietzsche, friedrich. "will to power." in will to power, by friedrich nietzsche, 158. new york: random house inc., 1968. 45issue vi ◆ spring 2019 cognition, domination and complexity 1) introduction cognition and control are like two intertwined vectors of domination. to identify something is to bring it into one’s own order, so that it may become knowable— so that it may be suppressed into boundaries which facilitate a clear and unified apprehension of it. to implement a law of nature is to organize phenomena into something apprehensible; to conceptualize something is to integrate it into parameters of explication, and, thus, into the order of the knowable. the human, which is unaware of its fate as being doomed to want to know—being doomed to need to make knowable—gives names and systems to nature so that it might bring phenomena into its order of identification, thereby dominating them. a system of sovereignty is no different; an empire that expands inevitably makes territories and peoples known to it; the state makes its territory knowable by imposing categories of representation onto geographical spaces, making its citizenry knowable by bringing it into its order of domination—into its realm of identification, so that it might know it. functions of control and functions of cognition intersect in the sense that both employ techniques of domination, identification being but one of these techniques, albeit a very important one. the eyeball, which observes physical phenomena, and the eye of a surveillance camera, are both products of the same drive—they express the command “make knowable!” conquest is a word that commonly describes the trajectory of empires or states, but the order of knowledge, too, has a conquest: a trajectory of cognitive-intellectual imperialism. if it is observable to us, then it is not immune from systematization and integration into something cognizable. not even the stars are out of reach from the cold hands of knowledge, which bring them into the realm of identification, and which systematize their organizations, giving them names, and applying laws to their behavior. the story of control on earth is one whose trajectory is guided by concepts, which have a relative autonomy in the sense that the power of the concept is the power of the particular control system that incarnates it and that is guided by it. internal to every regime of domination is a cohesive conceptual structure that determines the way it operates and functions. a critical reconfiguration of a concept necessitates a substantial reconfiguration of the control structure that envelops it. i start with the following points, which will be expounded upon in what follows: 1) cognition and control converge at the point of the integration of materials into organized aggregates, the partitioning of matter into distinct categories of representation, and the selection out of what is not capable of being schematized. 46 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college 2) higher-level operations of unification and integration—whether operations of a regime or operations of mind—are conditioned by the possibility of very high degrees of stratification at the level of structural organization. 3) stratification is not only a condition, but is also a shared tendency between cognition and control; the double-helix of control and cognition are connected by a bridge of stratification. functions at the level of the mind and mechanisms at the level of political control integrate, systematize, and identify (which necessarily implies a form of stratification). 4) structures of political control have as their internal mechanisms relatively autonomous concepts. relative autonomy is established in contradistinction to absolute autonomy, in the sense that concepts are not unconditioned platonic ideas, but are rather relatively autonomous, since the concept guides the functioning of the regime, and the totality of the conceptual structure functions independently of any individual subject thinking or apprehending it. 5) concepts and materiality interact with one another through relations of feedback and interpenetration. 2) stratification in this paper, i will be using the definition of stratification provided by gilles deleuze and félix guattari, wherein stratification “consist[s] of giving form to matters, of imprisoning intensities or locking singularities into systems of resonance and redundancy, of producing upon the body of the earth molecules large and small and organizing them into molar aggregates. strata are acts of capture; they are like ‘black holes’ or occlusions striving to seize whatever comes within their reach.”4 stratification (when considered at the level of materiality) is the suppression and imprisonment of primary intensive matter. stratification at this level is the process whereby the indeterminacy and disparate potentialities of intensive material flux are suppressed into more rigidified and complex forms of determinate organization. when one refers to something that is stratified, he speaks about something that can also be said to have some degree of sophistication, which necessarily implies order. stratification will be a useful concept, because we can use it to talk about the convergence of certain tendencies two different levels of matter without equivocating between levels. the two levels at which stratification occur are 1) the level of human cognition/cognitive activity in general, and 2) the level of materiality. while stratification extends to both levels, the precise nature of stratification implemented at one level is not reducible to 4 guattari, gilles deleuze and felix. "a thousand plateaus; capitalism and schizophrenia ." in a thousand plateaus; capitalism and schizophrenia, by gilles deleuze and felix guattari, 40. minneapolis : university of minnesota press, 1987. 47issue vi ◆ spring 2019 cognition, domination and complexity the nature of stratification at the other level; there is no equivocation between levels, only an “isomorphism without correspondence”5 between the two. 3) scientific conceptualization; physics in his will to power, friedrich nietzsche writes that “thinking in primitive conditions (pre-organic) is the crystallization of forms, as in the case of a crystal.—in our thought, the essential feature is fitting new material into old schemas (=procrustes’ bed), making equal what is new.”6 according to nietzsche, when we refer to human thought, we undertake a process of integration and equalization. if we look at certain disciplines of human knowledge, we can see this tendency of “making equal what is new”7 in a very potent and effective register. physics is a practice that often proceeds by integrating different lines of information (different causal chains) into simple and unified schemata that explain these phenomena.8 in the case of isaac newton, the law of universal gravitational attraction is such a schema in the sense that it is meant to explain highly diverse phenomena. yet, the law itself is a mathematical simplicity of sorts—the inverse square law.9 the simplicity of the law integrates the phenomena it is meant to explain into a unified system of understanding. the parameters of a scientific law are imposed onto phenomena in order to facilitate a conceptual understanding that can be further built upon, and the application of a law forms a schema through which the particular phenomenon in question is translated and codified, in the hope that the schema itself can also continue to be engaged with as science develops. phenomena hitherto not understood by us become dominated; occurrences in nature are colonized and partitioned into territories that now belong to the sovereignty of knowledge. what’s interesting, however, about this integration of phenomena into unified understandings is that, in observing the materials upon which these laws are imposed—such as the relations of the planets in orbit—there is nothing that suggests an essential simplicity that is absolutely independent of human cognition or perception. moreover, why is it that humans come to understand relatively diverse phenomena as implicitly capable of being integrated into a unified scientific or mathematical schema? we agree with nietzsche that the reason for this has to do with processes of integration and equalization as tendencies of cognitive functioning. the desire for more knowledge is the desire to integrate what is new into a schema that is further utilizable, and which can continue to be built upon. it is simply taken as a given that physical phenomena can be subjected to this process. 5 a thousand plateaus; capitalism and schizophrenia. minneapolis: university of minnesota press, 1987. 6 nietzsche, friedrich. "will to power." in will to power, by friedrich nietzsche, 273. new york : random house inc., 1968. 7 ibid. 8 for more on the relation between scientific laws and different causal chains, see stewart, jack cohen and ian. "collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world ." in collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world, by jack cohen and ian stewart, 13-14. new york: penguin books, 1994. 9 ibid. 48 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college 4) identification a) partitioning at a level that is further removed from specificity of scientific conceptualization, there is the act of identification in general. to speak of identification is to speak of a connection between points; the connection between the agent who identifies and the matter that comes to be identified as a thing. identification is the mechanism that bestows thinghood onto matter. identification is also an example of stratification at the level of human cognition; to the extent that identification integrates in the same way that processes of stratification integrate indeterminate matter into a determinate form. identification is an action that selects out; the bestowing of thinghood onto matter implies the partitioning and selection out of any difference that would disrupt the simple continuities involved in the apprehension of a thing as a particular thing. that which is different—or that primary intensive materiality which would overturn thinghood as a category coextensive with representation – is partitioned outside of the territory of identification. any particular instance of identification effectuates a partition at two different levels: 1) at the level of things; in the sense that to identify a thing or an aggregate of things is to select out other things, which are not part of that particular occurrence of identification, and, 2) at the level of primary intensive materiality; in the sense that what is primary at a material level is made to be something of the outside. to be more precise, it is made to be of a transcendental delimitation that relegates it to a territory that cannot be seen or spoken of—primary materiality is encased within the parameters of a distinction whereby it becomes delimited to an “in-itself ” on the side of a transcendental barrier that is across from thinghood. to impose this type of inside/outside distinction is precisely to enact a partition onto matter. according to immanuel kant, “pure reason” is a faculty that makes a similar partition. (this, indeed, is dependent on the extent to which we take kant to be saying that the phenomena/noumena distinction itself is an ‘idea of pure reason’.)10 the phenomena/noumena dichotomy is not a concept given through the categories of the understanding; rather, it indexes a point at which reason encounters a critical limit and produces this distinction in its striving to grasp an idea of which there cannot be knowledge. the idea in question is a world independent of our experience of it. in trying to conceive of this idea, thought becomes determined under such significant constraints that try to explicate the problem, which descends into deep conceptual rabbit holes. if it is true that we cannot know the things in themselves, then how can one speak in terms of a world completely independent of our experience, when to speak of a world is to speak within the parameters of our mechanisms of representation? and, as arthur schopenhauer (perhaps gratuitously) 10 for a more comprehensive and rigorous account of this partition and its implications, see kant, immanuel. critique of pure reason. new york: cambridge university press, 1998. 49issue vi ◆ spring 2019 cognition, domination and complexity pointed out, how can one speak of things-in-themselves when to speak of things is to imply multiple objects (the conditions for which are the inner intuitions of space and time)?11 a world independent of our experience would not contain multiple things that we cannot know—it would simply be unknowable altogether. but to follow this line of questioning is to miss the point completely. to speak about the problem strictly in terms of “we can/cannot know the things in themselves,” and to point out contradictions in the words being used to articulate it (like in schopenhauer’s case) wades into the pitfalls engendered by ‘dialectical reason.’12 (i. kant, transcendental dialectic, first book, on the concepts of pure reason 1998) (i. kant, second book of the transcendental dialectic, first chapter, the paralogisms of pure reason 1998) one could consider schopenhauer’s criticism: “how can you say thing in itself when even thinghood is something conditioned by out interaction with the world?” but this contradiction bespeaks the nature of the problem. it is precisely due to the nature of the possible pitfalls produced by this problem that kant knows to say very little about things-in-themselves or a world independent of our experience—he simply says that you may think it, but that you cannot cognize it. in this paper, i do not aim to take an extreme position on one side of the very famous and inflated philosophical divide that this problem precipitates. in fact, if kant were indeed correct, and if he were indeed saying what we take him to be saying, many of the philosophers who have fiercely articulated opposing positions of this divide have merely been bickering from two dyads of an antinomy of pure reason. instead, i am of the opinion that this idea of pure reason is a compelling example of partitioning at a transcendental level, which appears to be of something that has an extremely significant purchase on tendencies of thought. we do not take the fact that this inside/outside distinction is an idea of pure reason to mean that we cannot talk about processes that implicate such a partition; rather, we understand it to be a powerful example of this tendency that lends itself to the point that we are trying to make about the significance of partitioning as a feature of cognition. b) unification/complexity a thing is a type of simple unity that can be further integrated into other unified schemata of representation. if i am to identify an object that is in front of me, i can apprehend that object as a simplicity to the extent that it is totalizable in thought. i can integrate this object into a whole of compared and connected representations – a cognition, in the kantian sense of the word.13 not only does identification facilitate 11 schopenhauer, arthur. the world as will and representation. new york: dover publishing, 1969. 12 see kant, immanuel. critique of pure reason. new york: cambridge university press, 1998, specifically the sections; "transcendental dialectic, first book, on the concepts of pure reason." in critique of pure reason, by immanuel kant, 394-95. new york: cambridge university press, 1998., "second book of the transcendental dialectic, first chapter, the paralogisms of pure reason." in critique of pure reason, by immanuel kant, 438-39. new york: cambridge university press, 1998., and the section "transcendental dialectic." in critique of pure reason, by immanuel kant. in general, wherein illusion and fallacious inference of unrestricted pure reason is termed “dialectical.” 13 ibid. 50 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college more sophisticated operations of connecting and comparing representations, but the act of identification itself implicates the apprehension of simplicity to the extent that a thing is a unified simplicity. even if i can analyze and break down a thing into many different parts (or even different things), i will never stray outside the category of thinghood, and i cannot venture into the wilderness which identification partitions out without losing all semblance of thinghood and representation. underneath, however, the operations of simplicity lies a dense complexity that bears no resemblance to the identity of thinghood. contemporaneous with the apprehension of a simple identity such as thinghood are highly complex processes and firings at the molecular level of the brain. additionally, the brain itself is a highly complex structure with more densely layered intricacies in functioning than the most robust computer (currently, at least), and the brain is nested within the larger—but still highly complex—structure of the human body, which is far from short of coexisting and comingling systems of organization. the dense material complexity of the body is an example of a highly stratified structure, which functions as the productive conditioning for “higher-level” operations (in this case, operations of identification, cognition, representation) without resembling them. 5) conceptual regimes; societies of control in a short essay entitled “postscript on the societies of control,”14 deleuze identifies two distinct conceptual structures that accord with two distinct regimes of domination. at the time of writing the essay, according to deleuze, society was standing on a precipice that faces an auspicious horizon: the arrival of a new regime—control societies. the regime that michel foucault called the “disciplinary society” is progressively being phased out in favor of a regime with an essentially different conceptual structure.15 deleuze compares the structures of the two regimes and indexes distinctions that concern a difference of concepts. each of the two societies incarnates a distinct conceptual structure, and domination is effectuated in accordance to the structure of each particular concept. i believe that deleuze’s analysis and theoretical approach lend themselves to a concrete example of what we have been referring to as “conceptual regimes,” or regimes that are guided by concepts. the two concepts in question are not only a way to describe either regime, but they are also something that is said of each regime in a significant sense. below, we will briefly outline some of the structural differences that deleuze indexes in each regime. his allusion to the increasing level of complexity in the new regime also gives us another example of the dynamic between high degrees of stratification and simplicity. the distinctions between the two regimes discussed in the essay will be referenced in terms of identification, territory, and complexity. 14 deleuze, gilles. "postscript on the societies of control." october, 1992: 3-7. 15 ibid. “… a disciplinary society was what we already no longer were, what we had ceased to be. we are in a generalized crisis in relation to all the environments of enclosure – prison, hospital, factory, school, family.” 51issue vi ◆ spring 2019 cognition, domination and complexity identification: the precise manner in which each regime brings a citizenry into its order of identification presents two distinct cases. under the mechanisms of disciplinary societies, citizens are placed on one side of an individual/group partition, and are defined and identified by the regime in accordance with these limitations. the individual is determined in contradistinction to the group. but the workings of control societies facilitate an identification that is more abstract: “we no longer find ourselves dealing with the mass/individual pair. individuals have become “dividuals,” and masses, samples, data, markets or ‘banks.’”16 the aforementioned individual/ group partition no longer has a place in the primary conceptual mechanisms of control societies—operations of quantitative abstraction act on the populace such that they primarily become identified as abstract mathematical aggregates. territory: the spaces of disciplinary societies are analogically connected enclosures or molds. each enclosure is an independent variable that starts from zero. the individual is at school, now at work, now with the family; one “never stops starting” from zero.17 disciplinary societies consist in spaces in which the individual always starts from a blank slate in learning a new discipline (work, schooling, family). in contrast with this, societies of control are characterized by the continuous modulation of metastable states; one is always undergoing more training, preparation or schooling.18 the closures of disciplinary societies dissipate, opening wide onto a complicated, seemingly un-partitioned space of flux, continuity, and relationality that give themselves to power; there is no longer a political space because everything is now political; there is no space in which privacy exists to the extent that mechanisms of surveillance only become more and more sophisticated. the ‘public sphere’ is no longer a distinct, purely physical space, but rather becomes inverted and enmeshed with certain pockets of cyberspace. complexity/stratification and identity: the arrival of control societies at the impending end of the twentieth century bespeaks an omen which envisions a labyrinthine entanglement of connected serpent tails and cryptic vapors which conceal molecules of venom. the change from disciplinary societies to control societies indexes a distinct increase in complexity.19 (“the coils of a serpent are even more complex than the burrows of a molehill.”) the (conceptual) structure of the control regime is far more complex than the structure of the disciplinary regime it supersedes. this is also to say that control societies are more rigorously stratified than disciplinary societies. and it is none other than this dense level of stratification in terms of complex structural organization that facilitates the emergence of unified simplicities. a degree of stratification which is adequate to an idea of rigorous complexity is the condition for the possibility of emergent simplicities. in the particular case of a conceptual regime, 16 ibid. 17 ibid. 18 ibid. 19 “the coils of a serpent are even more complex than the burrows of a molehill.” ibid. 52 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college high complexity facilitates unifications and simplicities at the surface level of its functioning and instantiation. for, in fact, a corporation or a datum is nothing more than one of these mysterious, “emergent” simplicities?20 and to the extent that it becomes a function of political tactics that are currently deployed within control societies, is identity not one of these simplicities? the current tactical use of identity in american political spaces is extremely ubiquitous, from racial identitarianism on the right, to identity as a compartmentalizing mechanism for groups which are purported to require activist assistance on the left. meanwhile, many people who claim they would like to move away from “identity politics” have no problem appealing to the abstract identity of the country, the equalizing power of which is apparently sufficient in subsuming any and all adversarial relations between groups. identity has become widespread as a political tool because the current parameters of domination under which we are determined facilitate the intensified instantiation of this vaporous simplicity. obviously, identity is an illusion that has long had a formal reality contemporaneous with the abstract and material processes of the brain. it just so happens that the complexity of the current regime determines its effectiveness as a political tool. this is not something that was present when deleuze was analyzing the characteristics of control societies. perhaps even this highly complex regime has reached its critical point of saturation. 6) complexity the body another complex structure, which facilitates the ‘functioning of unities’ like identity, is the human. humans are highly stratified organisms. it is this high degree of stratification at the material level—in this case, at the level of the body—that facilitates the capacity to identify and stratify at the level of cognition. in general, highly stratified systems have the capacity to produce sophisticated schemata of unified and simple understandings. the high level of material stratification in the body as a whole also facilitates abstract functions like identity, concepts, and conceptualization. the human body is a highly complex machine, even within just the eye/brain connection alone. in a procedure that requires a high amount of processing power, the brain creates the illusory experience of looking “through” one’s eyes. in reality, however, the retina—which is at the back of the eye—stops all light, and what appears as a continuity of colors and shade are in fact “pictures” or “frames” that are discretely captured and transmitted as electrical impulses by the retina’s nerve cells (and then sent to the brain).21 in the 1960s, david hubel and torsten wiesel proved that about half of the nerves that connect the eye to the brain are not simply passive receptors of light input, and that some fibers in the optic nerve actually convey highly complex 20 deleuze, gilles. "postscript on the societies of control." october, 1992: 3-7. “… but in a society of control, the corporation has replaced the factory, and the corporation is a spirit, a gas.” 21 stewart, jack cohen and ian. "collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world." in collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world, by jack cohen and ian stewart, 155. new york: penguin books, 1994. 53issue vi ◆ spring 2019 cognition, domination and complexity messages to the brain in the form of electrical impulses.22 we see in three dimensional dimensions, even though our eyes only receive input from two. this is because both halves of the optic tectum (also known as the superior colliculus in the literature, a structure common to the mammalian midbrain, which contains the neuronal visual pathways of both eyes) receive information from each eye—the right side of each retina sends its information to the left side of the tectum, and vice versa.23 the ear is another very complex organic device; the extremely small hair cells (of which humans have 15,000) on the basilar membrane are tuned to specific frequencies so that particular pitches are sensed at different positions along the cochlea.24 the cochlea is a “tuned receptor” that converts frequencies from vibrations of the eardrum to corresponding positions of vibration in the basilar membrane.25 the brain itself is an organ that also has a deeply intricate “structure.” the cerebrum consists of two cerebral hemispheres, and each hemisphere is connected to the other by thick bands of nerve fibers, with one larger fiber known as the corpus callosum.26 each hemisphere has approximately three layers; the first and outer layer (i.e. the cerebral cortex), the second and central layer, which is made up of white matter, and the third and deepest layer (also known as the basila ganglia), which is made up of gray matter.27 if we look deeper into the brain, we find other structures such as the thalamus or the hypothalamus. each sub-structure of the brain has its own intricate internal organization, and different sections of the brain correspond to different aspects of cognitive function.28 the body is certainly replete with order and organization, and to this extent, qualifies as a very stratified aggregate of matter. 7) concepts and materiality concepts are not precluded from interacting with materiality by virtue of their abstract level/function. this notion presupposes a framing of the distinction between the abstract and the concrete, which is unsustainable to the extent that it implies a relation of strict separation between the two. in reality, the abstract and the concrete are enmeshed within each other, and thinking is both a locus of convergence and an interpenetration between the two levels. i do not wish to imply that the abstract and that the concrete are not distinct or different from one another. rather, we are calling into question the precise nature of their separation. they can be thought of 22 stewart, jack cohen and ian. "collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world." in collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world, by jack cohen and ian stewart, 156. new york: penguin books, 1994. 23 ibid. 24 stewart, jack cohen and ian. "collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world." in collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world, by jack cohen and ian stewart, 158. new york: penguin books, 1994. 25 ibid. 26 stewart, jack cohen and ian. "collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world." in collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world, by jack cohen and ian stewart, 170-171. new york: penguin books, 1994. 27 ibid. 28 ibid. 54 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college as two different and distinct levels, each with its own distinctive order and dynamic. additionally, the concrete and the abstract can also be understood as levels that are significantly interconnected and always in relations of mutual interaction. there is a widely discussed phenomenon in science that can give us examples of how different levels of matter can, while remaining distinct and disparate, be internally connected to one another. this is what is typically referred to as emergence. for example; the gas laws, which are indexed by statistical properties, are determined by dynamics at a micro-level (which is to say a non-statistical level);29 pressure is measured by the average number of molecules in a given region of gas; temperature is the average kinetic energy of the gas molecules.30the simple apprehensible averages constitutive of the gas laws are produced by dynamics at a level of matter that is different in nature from the “emergent” level of statistical features. a complex molecular dynamic (in this case, the interactions and dynamics of the gas molecules) produces molar simplicities (the averages which constitute the gas laws).31 another popular example of emergence is the case of the mandelbrot set, in which a high degree of geometrical complexity is generated by “simple” dynamical rules that bear no resemblance to what they produce. there is no apparent connection between the dense intricacies of the mandelbrot fractal and the terse simplicity of the rules for making the mandelbrot set. these examples are meant to demonstrate scientifically observable instances of feedback and resonance between disparate levels of matter. the contention is merely that a similar relation between levels exists in the case of the abstract-concrete distinction, not that this instance is fundamentally the same in nature as these scientific examples. if we accept that there are disparate levels of matter that are nevertheless in a relation, then we can establish the two most relevant levels to the problem of the abstract/concrete distinction. there is a conceptual level—an order of matter purely concerned with concepts—and an explicitly material level of matter. the former corresponds to what one might think of as the abstract and the latter as the concrete. the cognitive activity of a human brain (material/concrete level) imposes partitions onto concepts, which transforms and reconfigures said concepts (conceptual/abstract level) until the reconfiguration of the concept affects activity at the material level of matter. there exists a counter-effectuation of concept and materiality; the cognitive activity of humans entails conceptual re-configurations, implemented partitions, and transformations at the purely conceptual level. these transformations make a difference, insofar as that cognition imposes partitions that entail a distinct change in what thought is interacting with (thought engages with a re-configured concept), as 29 ibid. 30 stewart, jack cohen and ian. "collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world." in collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world, by jack cohen and ian stewart, 233-234. new york: penguin books, 1994. 31 for various thorough conceptualizations of relations between “molecular” and “molar”, see a thousand plateaus; capitalism and schizophrenia. minneapolis: university of minnesota press, 1987., and anti-oedipus; capitalism and schizophrenia. minneapolis: university of minnesota press, 1983. 55issue vi ◆ spring 2019 cognition, domination and complexity well as in how it is functioning. thinking a transformed concept, as well as thinking the transformation of a concept, exacerbates different tendencies and intensities of thought. a concept always corresponds to a degree of intensity—or an intensive zone—to the extent that the concept is grasped within thought. to provide a rough mathematic sequence of what occurs, a reconfiguration in the concept = a change in intensity = thought traverses a new zone of intensity. to the extent that thought is something that occurs in the brain, a material difference made in thought necessitates a difference made in materiality in general. the difference is made not only at a molecular level—the material processes that occur in the brain—but also at a molar level; differences made in thought can cause people to take different actions, and to react differently to stimuli than they otherwise would have. to re-encapsulate the dynamic, thought subsists in materiality and in material processes (thought subsists in a brain). thought enacts transformations at the level of concepts, the transformation of concepts, and enacts a new difference in thought, which effectuates change at molecular and molar levels of materiality. outlining this dynamic of abstract and concrete levels and their relation to thought also sheds light on the precise nature of thought’s position. that is, thought is a point of convergence and interpenetration between the two levels. what is abstract is immediately apprehensible to thought and is cognizable a priori. mathematical universals are the best example of this: a right angle, a straight line, an equilateral triangle, all of which are perfectly cognizable a priori. these things are immediately apprehensible and graspable in thought, and they have their own order of necessity. i am perfectly capable of cognizing a straight line a priori, and the essence of the straight line is such that if i imagine three straight lines congruent with one another, they each form an equilateral triangle. however, one never encounters in experience (i.e. ‘the concrete’) a perfectly straight line. what is ‘concrete,’ on the other hand, is clearly and immediately grasped by mechanisms of perception. yet, there are things encountered in experience that are clearly not cognizable a priori (or, at least, not as easily as our straight-line example). the example that aristotle gives is “the snub nose.”32 a misshaped nose is something immediately perceived; however, we cannot grasp it in thought with the same efficacy as we do with mathematical universals. the abstract is concrete in thought, but the concrete is abstract to thought. if we relate this configuration of the abstract/concrete distinction regarding thought to our discussion of conceptual/ material orders of matter, we can also view the interaction of the two orders (concepts and materiality) in another equally valid way; concepts are something abstract, and engage, and deal with, the concrete abstractly, or by virtue of abstract connections. the cognition of an object is an action that is enmeshed within the territory of the concrete, but the activity of cognition entails the powers and aspects of the abstract, abstract faculties, and the powers of abstraction.(i am tentatively defining abstraction 32 for a similar distinction between differences in accessibility of the abstract and the concrete, see aristotle’s metaphysics. 56 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college here as the apprehension of abstract properties [the straight/straight line], which are coextensive with the cognition and experience of a concrete object.) 8) the implementation of concepts in a regime in order that a regime effectively realize the concept that is said about it, concepts must be configured and interacted within a particular way. this can be understood in terms of the conceptual-materiality circuit. the material order and the conceptual order must interact in order to implement conceptual structures into material structures of control. a partitioning and value distribution process must occur in terms of concepts in order for this to happen. this is something that is necessary for the regime to employ, since concepts apprehended at a purely abstract level are not sufficient for political instantiation. take something like equality: even though a dichotomous relation can be said of purely conceptual articulations of equality— to the extent that equal/unequal is an abstract conceptual principle—articulations that are exclusively of the conceptual level are obviously not insufficient for politics. the order of the abstract on its own is too cold for political dynamics; heat must be applied in order to set things in motion. a partition must be applied to the concept, and values must be distributed according to the partition. at the conceptual level, a stricter partition must be applied to equality; the partition is imposed as an overlay to the purely conceptual dichotomy (equality/inequality), and different values are distributed to the two sides of the instantiated partition. in accordance with the relation of feedback between levels, the implementation of this partition functions on the part of those material institutions that conceive of it, who, in turn, determine the concept of equality in a certain way. the determination of this concept effectuates how the political program carries out that conception, and in what manner it does so at the actual/concrete level. it might be objected that the aforementioned dichotomy of equal/unequal already invokes a type of conceptual partition, even though we are talking about it as if it is something different in kind from the partitioning process. this type of dichotomy exists completely a priori, so even if a partition is said about it, it is a partition that occurs at a level irrelevant/distinct from the political instantiation of concepts. pairs of a priori conceptual differences, such as straight/curved, discrete/ continuous, or equality/inequality, are not deliberate partitions on the part of any given subject or regime. it would be more accurate to say that they are conceptual dichotomies that incarnate tendencies and internal limitations in thought. 9) conclusion; complexity–the order of knowledge and nihilism if we are told that the arrow of time necessarily corresponds to an increase in disorder, then the trajectories of both control structures and the domain of human knowledge would exemplify a tendency that does not accord with this postulate. the arrow of time that follows the trajectories of our control-cognition double helix also appears 57issue vi ◆ spring 2019 cognition, domination and complexity to correspond with a progressive increase of order rather than disorder over time. deleuze’s example of control societies alludes to this—political domination begins to become more complex, more sophisticated. even before the control society, the modern state in general appeared to index something particularly sophisticated and abstract. what exactly is the state? it is not completely physical since many of its important functions (such as law and rights) are not concrete. yet, despite not being completely physical, it clearly exists, and disobeying the injunctions of this thing that is not completely physical still has concrete material consequences (such as going to jail or paying a fine). on the other side of the double helix, the body of human knowledge becomes extremely saturated with systems and sub-systems of organization. knowledge considered as a total body is not only a system of information, preservation, and organization. it is also like a gigantic complex of interlocking and communicating systems. different intellectual disciplines communicate and interact with one another, often forming new sub-disciplines. sometimes there is even a synthesis that produces a completely novel field. even as older schemata become phased out or invalidated by new discoveries, archaic systems or ideas sometimes resonate with newer scientific projects, and can be re-integrated and updated into contemporary scientific practices. the order of knowledge is like an expanding but increasingly detailed web whose parallel lines resonate and communicate with one another. different sections of the web are sometimes folded into and connected to other parts of the web, yet, the structural totality retains its distinct parts, and the entire thing continues to increase in size and detail. however, as this web becomes more and more detailed, a corresponding dynamic arises that is different from the other dynamics contemporaneous with complexity that we touched upon earlier. this web of knowledge possesses within it unified simplicities, but there is no higher-level simplicity that emerges on behalf of this sprawling structure of complexity. in the complexity of the human body/brain, we have something like identity, as well as abstract operations of identification and cognition. in the practice of science, which is an activity within the body of knowledge, we have the conceptualization and unification of phenomena under laws of nature. with the increased complexity of control societies, we witness the emergent function of certain mechanisms like corporations, data sets, and code. where is the level of unification that corresponds to this highly stratified body of knowledge? there does not appear to be a connected level of unified simplicities and/or abstractions that corresponds to this complex web. however, this does not mean that there is no a corresponding dynamic related to the increasing order in the body of knowledge. as knowledge becomes more saturated with order, another tendency intensifies in connection with the former dynamic. if one looks up for a corresponding process of unification at a higher level, it looks like nothing is there. but if one looks down below, he will find that there is nothing. there seems to be a flattening effect; something becomes liquidated, something is increasingly becoming 58 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college leveled. the progressive acquisition and articulation of abstract universals on behalf of knowledge causes the implementation of a concrete universal of disenchantment among those organisms that are supposed to be its inheritors. the more about the world that is rigorously explicated and systematized on behalf of knowledge, the more that we seem to feel as if something that once deeply belonged to us is being expropriated from us before our very eyes. in fact, there seems to be almost no limit to what can be expropriated from our most cherished, personal intuitions about ourselves as they become articulated and codified into the colder, more impersonal territory of knowledge. this is because processes of knowledge and intelligence disintegrate, and what is being disintegrated are the givens upon which we have constructed very useful fortresses of illusion and ignorance that keep us sheltered from the outside. rather than producing a corresponding dynamic of unification, the trajectory of knowledge effectuates a dynamic of the intensified disintegration and destruction of unities —the destruction of givens which knowledge finds to have never existed in the first place. the liquidation of the ‘given’ opens humanity up to the absolute indifference of a universe that does not consider humankind to be nearly as important as it finds itself. looking to a universe that operates with complete autonomy (but with no knowledge), we find ourselves on the other side of that chiasmus, as something endowed with knowledge, but with little to no autonomy. in understanding itself to be determined by impersonal and autonomous processes which lack knowledge, something which possesses knowledge apprehends its own lack of autonomy. paradoxically, the condition of possibility for cognizing such a disparity is a condition that is produced by the autonomous—by a blind god. as the structure of knowledge becomes more saturated with order and detail, nihility coagulates and rises from the core of the earth, oozing through the cracks in the surface, melting the ground below us. but there is nowhere to go but further down. ◆ 59issue vi ◆ spring 2019 cognition, domination and complexity bibliography deleuze, gilles. "postscript on the societies of control." october, 1992: 3-7. deleuze, gilles and felix guattari. "a thousand plateaus; capitalism and schizophrenia ." in a thousand plateaus; capitalism and schizophrenia, by gilles deleuze and felix guattari, 40. minneapolis : university of minnesota press, 1987. —. a thousand plateaus; capitalism and schizophrenia. minneapolis: university of minnesota press, 1987. —. anti-oedipus; capitalism and schizophrenia. minneapolis: university of minnesota press, 1983. kant, immanuel. critique of pure reason. new york: cambridge university press, 1998. kant, immanuel. "second book of the transcendental dialectic, first chapter, the paralogisms of pure reason ." in critique of pure reason, by immanuel kant, 43839. new york: cambridge university press, 1998. kant, immanuel. "transcendental dialectic ." in critique of pure reason, by immanuel kant. kant, immanuel. "transcendental dialectic, first book, on the concepts of pure reason ." in critique of pure reason, by immanuel kant, 394-95. new york: cambridge university press, 1998. land, nick, interview by james flint. organization is suppression (february 1997). nietzsche, friedrich. will to power. new york: random house inc, 1968. schopenhauer, arthur. the world as will and representation. new york: dover publishing, 1969. stewart, jack cohen and ian. "collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world ." in collapse of chaos; discovering simplicity in a complex world, by jack cohen and ian stewart. new york: penguin books, 1994. 60 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college 61issue vi ◆ spring 2019 δι αν οι α 61 walter benjamin's [über den begriff der geschichte] and the marxist tradition maxwell wade walter benjamin’s “on the concept of history” has long puzzled readers due to its eclectic and novel theses that call into question orthodox understandings of religion, marxism, and historical progress. many readings have emphasized the feeling of rupture throughout the text, treating it as an intense break with his prior intellectual commitments,1 a political and theoretical “dark night of the soul” at the end of benjamin’s life. elements of the text certainly support this reading, and many interpreters, such as gershom scholem,2 take this text as a clear-cut rejection of benjamin’s prior marxism. in what follows, i aim to push back against this trend in scholarship and argue that “on the concept of history” can be understood as an attempt to move benjamin’s thought in a new direction, while still remaining faithful to radical political traditions and much of his earlier thought. i will begin by looking at various attempts to make sense of benjamin that fall short of adequately dealing with the nuances of the text. i will then analyze the theses themselves in an attempt to read them in tandem with other key texts from the marxist tradition, and will use that method to make sense of the political implications of “on the concept of history.” 1 wilde, marc de. “benjamin's politics of remembrance: a reading of ‘über den begriff der geschichte’.” a companion to the works of walter benjamin. ed. rolf j. goebel. rochester, ny: camden house, 2009. 177. 2 beiner, ronald. "walter benjamin's philosophy of history." political theory 12, no. 3 (1984): 423-434. 62 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college perhaps one of the most basic difficulties in benjamin scholarship with “on the concept of history” is the plethora of interpretations around it, many of which contradict each other. scholars frequently reach radically different conclusions about the meaning of the work and its place within benjamin’s thought, and consensus on this issue seems impossible. part of this difficulty, i believe, is rooted in an understanding of marxism and religion as intrinsically opposed or adversarial (it is no wonder benjamin’s audience would be left scratching its head at such a strange blending of jewish mysticism and radical politics). rainer nägele, for example, thinks that “benjamin was compelled to make a paradoxical turn, or umschlag, from politics to religion and this had to do with his psychology.”3 but it is not clear to me where the paradox lies in this turn, unless we are to take it that religion and politics are like oil and water, absolutely incapable of intermixing. others have even considered this text to represent a kind of melancholic neurosis in benjamin’s psyche,4 thereby completely domesticating, under the pretense of psychologism, many complicated or challenging insights in the text. being charitable, one might say that these psychological readings are able to give some insight into the conflicts and tensions that gave rise to such a unique and polarizing text. but they neglect the implications of the text itself, merely treating its content as such a theoretical oddity that it must be filed away under the category of “paradox” or “neurosis.” other interpretive frameworks for the theses seem to fare no better. as marc de wilde explains: the metaphor of the dwarf in the chess machine, which identifies the relation between historical materialism and theology as among the main philosophical stakes of benjamin’s theses, has prompted a debate between, on the one hand, scholars inspired by marxism who, in the wake of bertolt brecht’s observation that “the small work is clear and illuminating (despite its metaphors and judaisms),” emphasize the importance of historical materialism at the expense of theology, and, on the other hand, cultural theorists who, following in the footsteps of gershom scholem, emphasize the work’s “deep connections with theology,” claiming that “[often] nothing remains of historical materialism but the word.”5 both interpretative camps end up pursuing a certain method in their reading that emphasizes one aspect of the text at the expense of another. either marxism is given centrality while theology is pushed aside, or the opposite happens, and theology becomes the only relevant theme in the text. i agree with wilde’s assessment that “these interpretations, though not untrue, are one-sided.”6 they are founded on the same theoretical premise that axiomatically positions religion and marxism as 3 rapaport, herman. "benjamin as historian." clio 36, no. 3 (2007): 396. 4 ibid., 397. 5 wilde, “remembrance,” 180. 6 ibid., 181. 63issue vi ◆ spring 2019 walter benjamin's [über den begriff der geschichte] intrinsically opposed, with the coexistence of these two intellectual currents being taken as an oddity or abnormality. if marxism and mysticism are being talked about together in such a way that they are influencing or supplementing each other, the orthodox critic—either jewish or marxist—reacts immunologically against the “contamination” of their tradition by an outside influence. the orthodox marxist readers, à la brecht, are forced to jump through hoops to explain away the dominant messianic themes as either incidental or mere parables.7 the “cultural theorists,” conversely, take this text as an expression of jewish religiosity that only incidentally has similarities to radical political thought. these readings place ideological purity over textual fidelity to the point of incoherence, and in doing so, distort benjamin’s message that these theses “[do] not designate the precedence of one of these concepts over the other but rather points to their independence.”8 benjamin challenges his readers to rethink the relationship between marxism and religion, and unfortunately it seems that many have failed to live up to this task. of course, i speak to more than just the interplay between marxism and religion. readers have rightly pointed out from the start that benjamin’s reconceptualization of time and his subsequent rejection of progress, as well as his messianism and notions of redeeming the past, are all generally anathema to what is normally taken as the standard premises of marxist thought. if progressive teleology, future-oriented history, and a rejection of religious sentiment all constitute the theoretical core of marxism,9 then perhaps it is true that benjamin here is making a break with tradition. however, a close examination of both “on the concept of history” and selections from marx and engels will serve to complicate this picture, showing how benjamin is engaged in a project that seeks to bring back to the foreground certain elements in marx’s work that were glossed over by later readers in favor of a simpler, more “systematic” and uncomplicated marxism. first and foremost, we must turn our attention to benjamin’s reconceptualization of time. time is an overarching theme throughout the text and remains a crucial point of focus for benjamin’s attack. the metaphysics of time—how we conceptualize our place within history, and how time is treated politically are all intertwined, and 7 “according to tiedemann, even explicitly theological concepts in benjamin’s theses, such as ‘the messiah, redemption, the angel, and the antichrist,’ are thus merely to be taken as ‘images, analogies, and parables, and not in their real form.’” ibid. 8 ibid. 9 the label of “marxism” itself has a complicated and interesting history, especially since marx himself famously rejected the “marxism” of his contemporaries, saying “what is certain is that i myself am not a marxist.” the philologist michael heinrich takes this to mean marx was engaged in a constantly changing critical project, rather than a “rigid science” found in later leninist-inspired readers. this makes it quite difficult to pin down an “essence” of marxism or marxist thought, especially given the theoretical nuances of marx’s writing. a main point of this paper will be to problematize the notion of a singular or unified “marxism,” and instead look to see the ways in which benjamin, like other “unorthodox” thinkers, can still work within the tradition. see heinrich, michael. “je ne suis pas marxiste.” neues deutschland, january 24, 2015. accessed december 11, 2018. https:// www.neues-deutschland.de/artikel/959492.je-ne-suis-pas-marxiste.html. full english translation available at https://libcom.org/library/%e2%80%9eje-ne-suis-pas-marxiste%e2%80%9c. 64 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college “on the concept of history” —starts by interrogating a certain unifying concept of time that is dominant in our present historical epoch. the common notion of time in the modern capitalist era is one of “progression through a homogenous, empty time,”10 which is the primary mode of thought that serves as the basic conceptual framework of the past, present, and future. formally articulated by “positivist historians” like eduard meyer,11 this way of thinking about history rose to dominate the academic study of history and reflects the material changes that have occurred under capitalism. tied in with the development of new technologies used to subjugate both humanity and nature, this shift in thinking about time is a new development in consciousness (though it is surely one that has “corrupted the german working class” more than anything else).12 yet, unlike his earlier works in which historical or technological development would at least open up a new space of freedom, this progressivist historicism seems like pure illusion, an ideological deadend. for example, the innovation of the photograph is “the first truly revolutionary means of reproduction […which] for the first time in world history, technological reproducibility emancipates the work of art from its parasitic subservience to ritual.” 13 this apparent break with the dialectical understanding of technological progress that guided his historical work would surely constitute a break with benjamin’s prior marxism if it were the case. however, dialectical tensions are still deeply present within the theses. for all of the polemics against the universal history of historicism, benjamin also admits that “universal histories are not inevitably reactionary. a universal history without a structural [konstruktiv] principle is reactionary. the structural principle of universal history allows it to be presented in partial histories.”14 universal history “has no theoretical armature”15—no structure that lets it express the historical particular—and because of this it will produce reactionary tendencies. in this sense, universal history is an unmoored idealistic fantasy: “a kind of esperanto.”16 so, while it is true that “historicism rightly culminates in universal history,”17 it is not universal history that is itself the problem. in fact, it seems that the development of a universal history is a partial movement, one that is as of yet unfulfilled by bourgeois positivism. a true universal history is messianic in nature, as “the messianic world is the world of universal and integral actuality. only in the messianic realm does a 10 benjamin, “on the concept of history,” in benjamin, walter. selected writings, volume 4, 1938-1940. edited by howard eiland and michael w. jennings. cambridge [ma] and london: belknap press (2003), 395. 11 ibid., 401. 12 ibid., 393. 13 benjamin, “the work of art in the age of its mechanical reproducibility” (1936-1939), in benjamin, walter. selected writings, volume 4, 1938-1940. edited by howard eiland and michael w. jennings. cambridge [ma] and london: belknap press (2003), 256. a similar example is film, which “enriched our field of perception… by its use of close ups, by its accentuation of hidden details in familiar objects, and by its exploration of commonplace milieux through the ingenious guidance of the camera.” ibid., 265. 14 benjamin, “history,” 404. 15 ibid. 16 ibid. 17 ibid., 396 65issue vi ◆ spring 2019 walter benjamin's [über den begriff der geschichte] universal history exist.”18 universal history “comes too early” and does not tether itself to the historical materialist framework that can properly give it meaning. this ambivalent dialectical tension within universal history indicates that benjamin fully recognizes that there is a glimmer of freedom being opened up within progressivism. yes, it is woefully destructive, but within that destruction is an element that points toward a redemptive, utopian vision. here, a natural parallel to marx emerges: the bourgeoisie, wherever it has got the upper hand, has put an end to all feudal, patriarchal, idyllic relations…in one word, for exploitation, veiled by religious and political illusions, it has substituted naked, shameless, direct brutal exploitation…all that is solid melts into air, all that is holy is profaned, and man is at last compelled to face with sober senses, his real conditions of life, and his relations with his kind.19 marx, like benjamin, is no stranger to the horrors of progress, yet the horror likewise opens up a new clarity and vision of an unalienated world. like the change in the structure of experience that allows for humanity to be able to “face with sober senses” the exploitation they experience, the change in our historical understanding of time and the past compels one to rethink universal history in a genuine, messianic light.20 much like the previous case of universal history, benjamin’s idea of messianic time has also confounded many scholars (and not just due to its intentionally religious language). in thesis a, benjamin speaks about historicism as “content[ing] itself with establishing a causal nexus among various moments in history […] the historian who proceeds from this consideration […] tell[s] the sequence of events like the beads of a rosary,” i.e., one after the other.21 benjamin critiques this precisely because it fails to grasp history as a meaning-giving endeavor: “no state of affairs having causal significance is for that very reason historical. it became historical posthumously, as it were, through events that may be separated from it by thousands of years.”22 the historicist wrongly treats history as a series of events, and, in doing so, fails to realize that events only become historical in retrospect when we reflect upon them and situate their significance in world history. 18 ibid., 404. 19 karl marx, manifesto of the communist party, in: the marx-engels reader, ed. robert c. tucker (new york: norton, 1972) 473-474. 20 it seems reasonable as well to draw a parallel here with the “change in the structure of experience” benjamin speaks about in his essay on baudelaire. here too there is a loss, a death of a certain aesthetic style, but in this experience of loss there is a new distance created with which one can view history, or in this case, poetry, in a new light. see benjamin, “on some motifs in baudelaire” (1939), in benjamin, walter. selected writings, volume 4, 1938-1940. edited by howard eiland and michael w. jennings. cambridge [ma] and london: belknap press (2003), 313-55. 21 benjamin, “history,” 397. 22 ibid. 66 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college this was not a point lost on marx. in his preface of the contribution to the critique of political economy, marx writes that: the bourgeois mode of production is the last antagonistic form of the social process of production – antagonistic not in the sense of individual antagonism but of an antagonism that emanates from the individuals' social conditions of existence – but the productive forces developing within bourgeois society create also the material conditions for a solution of this antagonism. the prehistory of human society accordingly closes with this social formation.23 this passage begins with the standard marxian understanding of capitalism as that which generates its own conditions of abolition from within. indeed, though the final portion of the quote is the most noteworthy: all of human “history” is mere prehistory up to and including the present. we are living in a prehistorical epoch and only with communism can history truly begin. this is a radically benjaminian point, to put it in an intentionally anachronistic way, as the past only gains its meaning when viewed through the lens of the utopian messianic time—a time so radically different that it cannot be on the same historical continuum as that which came before. one can likewise read this passage together with another thesis by benjamin: only when the course of historical events runs through the historian’s hands smoothly, like a thread, can one speak of progress. if, however, it is a frayed bundle unraveling into a thousand strands that hang down like unplaited hair, none of them has a definite place until they are all gathered up and braided into a coiffure.24 mapping marx’s schema onto this passage, we can speak of human “prehistory,” (i.e., all hitherto existing class societies) as the “frayed bundle unreeling into a thousand strands,” a mismatched collection of disparate events without meaning or cohesion. however, the communist moment is that which gathers up these historical strands and unifies them into a universal history. only then can we speak of progress or of genuine history.25 this discussion is valuable because it us can help make sense of benjamin’s call to redeem the past and how it can relate to marxism. simply stated, communism is the movement to redeem the past and set history right. benjamin openly and explicitly explores this theme, first with the idea that “there is a secret agreement between past 23 marx, karl. a contribution to the critique of political economy. translated by s. w. ryazanskaya. (moscow: progress, 1977). accessed from https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1859/critique-pol-economy/index. htm. italics added 24 benjamin, “history,” 403. 25 some interpreters may contest this reading of benjamin on the grounds that this passage from new theses c is arguing for the structural impossibility of history to run smoothly, therefore indicating the ultimate impossibility of progress. in this case, the comparison with marx is invalid. however, given benjamin’s other comments on the messianic nature of a (true) universal history, it seems quite coherent to suggest that a redeemed history is one in which time can finally progress without catastrophe or fragmentation. 67issue vi ◆ spring 2019 walter benjamin's [über den begriff der geschichte] generations and the present one” that “endowed [us] with a weak messianic power.”26 this connection between the past and present establishes a historical continuity in which messianic power is importantly not something that comes from the outside, as in more orthodox theological conceptions, but rather is something possessed by humanity. mankind has the power to redeem itself—to “succeed in ridding itself of all the muck of ages”27—thereby transforming the past. the past is transformed precisely because, as benjamin puts it, class struggle “has effects that reach far back into the past. they constantly call into question every victory, past and present, of the rulers.”28 a successful communist revolution means that the blood and suffering of past revolutions were not in vain and that the lives of all revolutionaries, past and present, have contributed to the same final goal. benjamin recognizes that this has been at work within the more radical strands of marxism, as the proletariat is “the avenger that completes the task of liberation in the name of generations of the downtrodden. this conviction, which had a brief resurgence in the spartacist league, has always been objectionable to social democrats.”29 the choice of the name of the spartacist league is of course not incidental, but is rather a form of remembrance and continuity that reaches back into the past. the revolting proletarians in germany share the same lineage and connection with the slave revolts of ancient rome, in the same way that “to robespierre, ancient rome was a past charged with now-time, a past which he blasted out of the continuum of history. the french revolution viewed itself as rome reincarnate.”30 benjamin rightly points out the ways in which truly radical movements have challenged oppression precisely through their shared identification with past struggles, rather than an attempt to redeem future generations.31 redemption of the past is intrinsically tied to historical memory and a sense of shared struggle with prior movements, and this, too, existed in the works of marx and engels. perhaps the best and most striking example of this comes from engels’ the peasant war in germany, in which he examines the peasant revolts of the 16th century not merely as a discrete and isolated historical event, but as something that still bears connections and inspiration for revolutionary movements of his time. he writes with great admiration for the radical mystic thomas müntzer: only in the teachings of muenzer did these communist notions find expression as the desires of a vital section of society. through him they were formulated with a certain definiteness, and were afterwards found in every great convulsion of the people, until gradually they merged with the 26 ibid., 390. 27 karl marx, the german ideology, in: the marx-engels reader, ed. robert c. tucker (new york: norton, 1972) 193. 28 benjamin, “history,” 390. 29 ibid., 394. 30 ibid., 395. 31 ibid., 394. 68 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college modern proletarian movement…his political programme touched upon communism, and there is more than one communist sect of modern times which, on the eve of the february revolution, did not possess a theoretical equipment as rich as that of muenzer of the sixteenth century.32 this passage may surprise some readers, as the stereotype of marx and engels as militant atheist arch-materialists still persists. yet, the identification with religious mysticism as a revolutionary force runs throughout the text, and engels sees the revolutionary movements of the medieval period as being fundamentally of the same nature as proletarian movements in his time.33 another example of this is how “[marx and engels] shared hegel's high esteem for the sixteenth century german mystic and heretic jacob boehme, saluted by marx in the rheinische zeitung in 1842 as ‘a great philosopher.’”34 here, too, we see the positive appraisal of mysticism by marx and engels, particularly in the sense that mystical thinkers were able to glean great insights into politics and philosophy, perhaps even to the extent that “secular” thinkers were not capable of. finding these themes in marx requires a little more digging; his job as a journalist often meant that most of his time was spent writing about the present, not just past revolutions in antiquity. in recent decades, however, more attention has been paid to marx’s ethnological notebooks, and scholars like franklin rosemont and kevin anderson have sought to explore the ways in which marx saw revolutionary potential in premodern and non-western social arrangements. additionally, marx was fascinated throughout his life by past societies and their relevance for communism, developing a deep fascination with the iroquois confederacy and the ways in which this society serves as an alternative mode of life to capitalism. his anthropological notes reveal that “it was not only iroquois social organization, however, that appealed to him, but rather a whole way of life sharply counter-posed, all along the line, to modern industrial civilization.”35 another example of this can be found in his studies of russia, which focus on the ways in which the communal lifestyle of the peasantry can provide an alternative pathway than capitalism. in his letter to zasulich, marx writes that “his recent studies of russian society had ‘convinced me that the commune is the fulcrum for a social regeneration in russia.’”36 equally relevant is his comment in the preface to the russian edition of the communist manifesto, wherein he posits 32 engels, friedrich. the peasant war in germany. (moscow: progress publishers, 1969). 30, 37. 33 likewise, it is important to note how engels admired utopian religious communities as excellent examples of communism. for example, “in 1844 we find engels writing sympathetically of american shaker communities, which he argued, proved that ‘communism... is not only possible but has actually already been realized.’” rosemont, franklin. karl marx & the iroquois. (red balloon collective, 1992). 5. 34 ibid., 6. 35 ibid., 14. 36 anderson, kevin b., "marx's late writings on non-western and precapitalist societies and gender," in rethinking marxism 14, no. 4 (2002): 89. 69issue vi ◆ spring 2019 walter benjamin's [über den begriff der geschichte] that “russia’s peasant communal land-ownership may serve as the point of departure for a communist development.”37 these passages are illuminating precisely because they point to a strand of marx’s thinking that emphatically rejects the blind progressivism that benjamin is critiquing in his theses. marx is neither shrugging off the suffering caused by capitalism as a historical inevitability nor is he treating communism as a far-off world of the future. rather, he is searching for alternative developmental paths for the world to take and looking at ways in which communal, egalitarian lifestyles are present in the world at the time of his writing. the great irony is that at the very moment that his russian "disciples" those "admirers of capitalism," as he ironically tagged them were loudly proclaiming that the laws of historical development set forth in the first volume of capital were universally mandatory, marx himself was diving headlong into the study of (for him) new experiences of resistance and revolt against oppression by north american indians, australian aborigines, egyptians and russian peasants.38 this leaves us with new view of marx that is more in line with benjamin’s perspective. not only are marx and engels deeply interested in the historical continuity between their struggle and past movements, but they also engage with many of the same philosophical issues as well. challenging simplistic notions of historical progress, as well as grounding communism as an immanent human reality, results in a marxism that harmonizes—rather than clash—with benjamin’s most radical theses.39 this understanding can also help shed light on the notorious passage from thesis xviia, in which benjamin writes that “marx says that revolutions are the locomotive of world history. but perhaps it is quite otherwise. perhaps revolutions are an attempt by the passengers on this train—namely, the human race—to activate the emergency brake.”40 on the face of it, this seems radically conservative, rather than revolutionary, intimating that the point of revolution is an attempt to stop history where it is and bring things to a standstill, presumably to prevent further decay. yet, it seems quite plausible to read marxian strands here, despite the openly critical attitude benjamin takes toward him in this section. reading the two together, one can take the idea that “the history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class 37 marx, karl, and frederick engels. "preface to the manifesto of the communist party." marxist internet archive. accessed december 13, 2018. https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ preface.htm. 38 rosemont, “iroquois,” 30. 39 it is important to note, of course, that it is unlikely (or in some cases, impossible) that benjamin had read all of these texts from marx and engels’ corpus. in many ways, their philosophical convergence on some of the same issues and themes points toward the fact that all three thinkers were dealing with many of the same philosophical dilemmas and reached similar conclusions. 40 benjamin, “history,” 402. 70 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college struggles”41 is the locomotive of what benjamin calls “world history.” this world history is mere prehistory for marx, however, as genuine history has not yet begun, and communist society with its abolition of the division of labor42 will bring about history in earnest. therefore, if class struggle is the locomotive of (pre)history, then it is perfectly coherent to speak about communist revolution as an emergency brake: with the abolition of class society, there is no more “motor” to drive history and “world history” is brought to an end. benjamin expresses this end of history as a messianic time, a wholly new state of consciousness, and marx, too, understands communism as a vision in which mankind reaches a new, unalienated consciousness. in his reading of this passage, the contemporary philosopher benjamin noys proposes a reading that reaches similar conclusions: the conclusion is that the emergency brake is not merely calling to a halt for the sake of it, some static stopping at a particular point in capitalist history (say swedish social democracy – which the american republican right now takes as the true horror of ‘socialism’). neither is it a return back to some utopian pre-capitalist moment, which would fall foul of marx and engels’s anathemas against ‘feudal socialism’. rather, benjamin argues that: ‘classless society is not the final goal of historical progress but its frequently miscarried, ultimately [endlich] achieved interruption.’ we interrupt to prevent catastrophe, we destroy the tracks to prevent the greater destruction of acceleration.43 this analysis is particularly apt in the way that it recognizes that the pulling of the emergency brake signals not only a rethinking of the kind of historical progression that we are experiencing, but also a radical attempt to break with the whole history of class society. noys likewise focuses in on a clever double-entendre with break/ brake, as “benjamin’s interruption suggests a more definitive break (or brake) with the aim of production. the stopping of the angelic locomotive tries to jump the tracks of history, or jump out of the vision of history as infinite waiting for the revolutionary situation.”44 this “jump” out of history is, after all, “the dialectical leap marx understood as revolution.”45 in fact, even within this same thesis (xviia), benjamin acknowledges the insight made by marx in this regard. he begins by saying that “in the idea of classless society, marx secularized the idea of messianic time. and that was a good thing.”46 he is, in a very clear way, acknowledging his intellectual indebtedness to marx—something not really plausible when one considers this text his “break” with marxism—and sees 41 marx, manifesto, 473. italics added. 42 marx, german ideology, 160. 43 noys, benjamin. malign velocities: accelerationism and capitalism. (lanham: john hunt publishing, 2014) 63. 44 ibid. 45 benjamin, “history,” 395. 46 ibid., 401. 71issue vi ◆ spring 2019 walter benjamin's [über den begriff der geschichte] the error as rooted in the social democrats’ elevation of this to an abstract, idealistic principle.47 not only does this emphasize that the problem only began with the social democrats (not marx, who therefore has a correct, or at least unproblematic, understanding of classless society), but he also indicates the ways in which benjamin remains loyal to a materialist outlook that rejects elevating one’s political goals into an unreachable “infinite task.” this move toward abstraction is closely tied with the “empty and homogenous time” spoken of earlier, as “once the classless society had been transformed into an infinite task, the empty and homogenous time was transformed into an anteroom, so to speak, in which one could wait for the emergence of the revolutionary situation with more or less equanimity.”48 returning to marx, we again can see two resonant parallels between the two thinkers. the simplistic, reductionist (but unfortunately commonplace) reading of marx would take him as placing communism in a far-off and distant future, maintaining that future-oriented stance that benjamin so aggressively critiques in this text. likewise, another common misreading of marx takes communism as yet another political ideology, an idealistic framework that needs to be imposed on society from the outside. yet, marx explicitly states otherwise in the german ideology, wherein he famously writes that “communism is for us not a state of affairs which is to be established, an ideal to which reality [will] have to adjust itself. we call communism the real movement which abolishes the present state of things.”49 the abstract as a political goal is rejected precisely because it forces reality to conform to it and is, therefore, an arbitrary and alien imposition on the world that is unmoored from its material conditions. like benjamin, there is a rejection of the future tense: the misunderstandings of communism are both that which is “to be,” while true communism is squarely focused on the present state of things. it is focused on the here and now, and its power lies precisely in its immanence to the world as it is. communism is not external or foreign, but rather is “the real movement,” i.e., the movement that actually exists in the world as it is right now. when benjamin speaks about classless society as “frequently miscarried,”50 it still means the world is still “pregnant” with communism, much in the same way that marx sees “the conditions of [the] movement result[ing] from the premises now in existence.”51 this immanence is even more clearly explicated in his notion of messianic time, which shoots the present moment like splinters.52 likewise, “every second was the small gateway in time through which the messiah might enter.”53 these numerous passages all point toward a conception of utopia that is radically immanent 47 “it was only when the social democrats elevated this idea to an ‘ideal’ that the trouble began.” ibid. 48 ibid., 402. 49 marx, german ideology, 162. 50 benjamin, “history,” 402. 51 marx, german ideology, 162. 52 benjamin, “history,” 397. 53 ibid. 72 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college in its temporality, framing the revolutionary break as something that can happen at any time, which is not contingent upon some sort of “historical development” that justifies the exploitation and suffering leading up to it. therefore, we can take “on the concept of history” as representing an attempt to synthesize the systematic and utopian tendencies within marxism and bring it together into a unified whole. historical materialism, as a rational and systematic historical framework, understands the role of class struggle and revolution, while messianism, as the utopian dream of redemption and salvation, recognizes the immanence of this radical change and the need to redeem the past from its suffering. both serve as meaning-giving structures that help one understand the past and present, but not in such a way that resorts back to bourgeois historicism and positivist historiography. the two elements not only complement each other, but they also exert mutual influence in their coexistence, working together to provide a proper political program that can bring about this shattering of time and redemption of the world that benjamin writes about. ultimately, the text should be understood neither as a rejection of the marxist tradition, nor as an attempt to add a seemingly foreign element—religion—into the theoretical mixture. rather, benjamin is drawing on what is already latent in the text, and casts it in a new light, in order to draw attention to it and to cause readers to reevaluate their ossified, overly rigid notions of marxism and revolution. it is a corrective measure against the failings and shortcomings of the social democrats that have ruined the workers’ movement and have let fascism triumph. it is precisely for this reason that this text needs to be understood in continuity with what has come before. benjamin is working to redeem marxism and salvage the messianic sparks hidden within, all while remaining loyal to what has come before. ◆ 73issue vi ◆ spring 2019 walter benjamin's [über den begriff der geschichte] bibliography anderson, kevin b., "marx's late writings on non-western and precapitalist societies and gender," in rethinking marxism 14, no. 4 (2002). beiner, ronald. "walter benjamin's philosophy of history." political theory 12, no. 3 (1984): 423-434. benjamin, andrew. walter benjamin and history. a&c black, 2005. benjamin, walter. “on the concept of history,” in benjamin, walter. selected writings, volume 4, 1938-1940. edited by howard eiland and michael w. jennings. cambridge [ma] and london: belknap press (2003). benjamin, walter. “on some motifs in baudelaire” (1939), in benjamin, walter. selected writings, volume 4, 1938-1940. edited by howard eiland and michael w. jennings. cambridge [ma] and london: belknap press (2003) benjamin, walter. “the work of art in the age of its mechanical reproducibility” (1936-1939), in benjamin, walter. selected writings, volume 4, 1938-1940. edited by howard eiland and michael w. jennings. cambridge [ma] and london: belknap press (2003) engels, friedrich. the peasant war in germany. moscow: progress publishers, 1969. heinrich, michael. “je ne suis pas marxiste.” neues deutschland, january 24, 2015. accessed december 11, 2018. löwy, michael. fire alarm: reading walter benjamin's ‘on the concept of history’. verso, 2005. löwy, michael. "fire alarm: walter benjamin’s critique of technology." in democratic theory and technological society, pp. 271-279. routledge, 2017. löwy, michael. "walter benjamin and marxism." monthly review 46, no. 9 (1995): 11-20. marx, karl. a contribution to the critique of political economy. translated by s. w. ryazanskaya. moscow: progress, 1977. marx, karl. the german ideology, in: the marx-engels reader, ed. robert c. tucker. new york: norton, 1972. marx, karl. manifesto of the communist party, in: the marx-engels reader, ed. robert c. tucker. new york: norton, 1972. marx, karl, and frederick engels. "preface to the manifesto of the communist party." marxist internet archive. accessed december 13, 2018. noys, benjamin. malign velocities: accelerationism and capitalism. lanham: john hunt publishing, 2014. 74 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college rapaport, herman. "benjamin as historian." clio 36, no. 3 (2007): 391-409. rosemont, franklin. “karl marx & the iroquois”. red balloon collective, 1992. smith, chadwick. "walter benjamin: images, the creaturely, and the holy." (2013). smith, cyril. karl marx and the future of the human. lexington books, 2005. steinberg, michael p., ed. walter benjamin and the demands of history. cornell university press, 1996. wilde, marc de. “benjamin's politics of remembrance: a reading of ‘über den begriff der geschichte’.” a companion to the works of walter benjamin. ed. rolf j. goebel. rochester, ny: camden house, 2009. 75issue vi ◆ spring 2019 δι αν οι α patočka's critique of husserl: the possibility of a-subjective phenomenology1 gabriel vidal phenomenology embodies the project of founding a new philosophical departure, one detached, if possible, from the mistakes—and especially of the biases—of former traditions and serves as a proper philosophical foundation.2 the founder of this tradition, edmund husserl, proposes breaking with the subjective excesses of idealism and the naïve schemes of realism. this implies the task of debunking two theses: on one hand, the idea that the subject is the creator of the objects that appear to him and, on the other, the idea of the absolute independence of objects, or the thesis of the thing in itself.3 the path taken by husserl in order to debunk both theses aims to restore the connection between the two dimensions at stake—subjectivity, and objectivity—by putting at the forefront their correlation. to do this, we must abstain ourselves from anticipating any unproven thesis in our investigation and exclusively refer back to the description of appearances in themselves. this is because everything that has the slight possibility of entering into our consideration does so 1 this article contains quotes that are originally in spanish. all translations have been made by me in this case. 2 david woodruff smith, “phenomenology,” in the stanford encyclopedia of philosophy, ed. edward n. zalta, summer 2018 (metaphysics research lab, stanford university, 2018), https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/ sum2018/entries/phenomenology/. 3 this mainly refers to kant’s thesis as outlined in critique of pure reason immanuel kant, critique of pure reason, ed. paul guyer and allen w. wood (cambridge: cambridge university press, 1999). however, it does not only refer to kant’s interpretation, but to whatever doctrine that considers the object as completely independent of a subject’s knowledge or experience. 76 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college insofar as it appears, and thus only the ways things appear will bring light to the mentioned correlation. phenomenology asks us to attend exclusively to what is given in our description of it. staying in this dimension of primitive donation4 of content is what gives phenomenology its rigor, to which husserl remains faithful in the creation of this new science. nonetheless, many posterior phenomenologists have criticized husserl for overemphasizing one of the two poles of the correlation—namely, the subjective— and so accusations of subjectivism became commonplace in transcendental phenomenology.5 the appearance seems to be constantly described in terms of a donation towards and made by the consciousness of a subject, and the acts by which the subject point to objects, but not the other way around.6 the problem is that most of the successors have simply disregarded husserl’s point of view, and have restarted the task from mostly different considerations without taking into account his foundational concerns. jan patočka is one of the few authors who has revised the foundational problem of phenomenology from a properly husserlian approach to mind. if we agree on the fact that husserl was successful in setting the foundations of phenomenology, then we could claim that, if those foundations are incorrect, then further developments of phenomenology are completely misguided. however, if we can correct husserlian phenomenology from its mistakes while keeping the foundation unaffected, then we can be reassured of phenomenology’s future. this is why the possibility of phenomenology itself may be at stake under patočka’s criticism. if phenomenology, since its inception, already carried a bias in favor of subjectivism, then it was doomed to be a failed attempt at a new departure from former tradition. patočka’s intention is, indeed, to correct this misguided inclination towards subjectivism in husserl’s account, while keeping the fundamental features of phenomenology that allow us to recognize it as unaffected. i will proceed in showing the most important elements of husserl’s phenomenology: constitution, epoché and reduction, the husserlian description of perception, and the noesis/noema scheme. then, i will show patočka’s attacks to the previously mentioned points and how these critiques reveal a subjectivist tendency in husserl, specifically in the gesture of reduction. finally, i will demonstrate patočka’s proposal of an a-subjective phenomenology that dispenses with reduction and explores a world-horizon as the a priori background of appearances. 4 the original word is “donación”. it means something like “to be given as it is”. when a content is given to consciousness, or makes its presence into it, that’s a donation or (donación). 5 robert j. dostal, “subjectivism, philosophical reflection and the husserlian phenomenological account of time,” in phenomenology on kant, german idealism, hermeneutics and logic: philosphical essays in honor of thomas m. seebohm, ed. o. k. wiegand et al. (dordrecht: springer netherlands, 2000), 53, https://doi. org/10.1007/978-94-015-9446-2_4. 6 george alfred schrader, “philosophy and reflection: beyond phenomenology,” the review of metaphysics 15, no. 1 (1961): 92. 77issue vi ◆ spring 2019 patočka's critique of husserl ii. husserl’s phenomenology the necessity of showing the correlation is first seen in logical investigations,7 where husserl engages in a critique of psychologism, which he claims reduces the logical dimension to that of empirical psychology, and completely disregards its apodictic and ideal character.8 in order to elucidate this issue, husserl traces a distinction between the acts, which allows thoughts about content, and the contents themselves, whereas psychologism reduces all logic only to the acts.9 in this way, he shows that the same content can be conceived of, by employing completely different acts of thought (for example, the number “5” can be given to consciousness from conceiving five points as well as five lines). this demonstrates that in order to elucidate the issue of both the ideality and empirical reality of math and logic, it is necessary to pay attention to the correlation of contents and acts in a completely unbiased way, without advancing any thesis about it. therefore, the inquiry will be about how it is possible that these ideal entities appear in consciousness, or how the apodictic can make its way “inside” something that is singular and contingent. the issue is solved when it is realized that, although ideal entities make their way into consciousness by means of acts, “the subject cannot constitute whatever signification, so constituent acts depend on the essence of the objects in consideration.”10 here, the concept of constitution is discovered. that is, contents appear; they are not constructed, but are rather brought into presence. constituent acts are “what makes the object representable” and “do not entail anything else but the act of going out to encounter the entity, in such a way that this entity, in the same act by which it is encountered, can announce itself.”11 this way of conceiving the donation of objects makes husserl think of consciousness differently. consciousness is always a consciousness of something, such that the content of its consideration always accompanies it.12 it is not a closed-in-itself structure that is then filled with contents, but it is in itself the pointing towards the object. that activity defines consciousness’ essence. this is pure direction of consciousness towards the object—or intentionality—is the only thing that we can properly affirm about consciousness.13 this allows husserl to affirm that constitution does not equal the construction of the object: the act is not, in some way, the absorption of the object inside a closed in consciousness, but is rather the appearance of the object to 7 edmund husserl, logical investigations (routledge, 2013). 8 dan zahavi, husserl’s phenomenology (stanford university press, 2003), 8–9. 9 robert hanna, “husserl’s arguments against logical psychologism,” edmund husserl: logische untersuchungen, 2008, 78. 10 walter biemel, “las fases decisivas en el desarrollo de la filosofía de husserl,” in husserl. tercer coloquio filosófico de royaumont (buenos aires: paidós, 1968), 46. 11 ibid., 47. 12 carlo ierna, “making the humanities scientific: brentano’s project of philosophy as science,” in the making of the humanities. volume iii: the making of the modern humanities, ed. rens bod, jaap maat, and thijs weststeijn (amsterdam university press, 2014), 547. 13 a. david smith, “husserl and externalism,” synthese 160, no. 3 (2008): 319–20. 78 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college an intentional consciousness (the object is pointed by intentionality and makes its presence). i have said that in order to describe ‘appearance as such,’ one must attend to what is given, refraining from fabricating conjectures outside that pure donation. this motivates husserl, in ideas i,14 to pin down what this refraining attitude consists in. he calls this the epoché, and by means of this epoché, we can: put out of action the general thesis which belongs to the essence of the natural standpoint, we place in brackets whatever it includes respecting the nature of being: this entire natural world therefore which is continuously ‘there for us”, ‘present to our hand’, and will ever remain there, is a ‘factworld’ of which we continue to be conscious, even though it pleases us to put it in brackets.15 this does not imply the denial of the existence of the world, but implies, rather, its independence as a reality in itself. in this case, it would be possible for the world to be independent of any constituent act. denying this thesis, then, allows one to make the world appear to an intentional consciousness instead of speculating about it without evidence. what appears to the intentional consciousness constitutes evidence,16 and what does not appear to it is just subjective construction. so, one can see that the epoché not only implies a suspension of the thesis of the independence of the world, but that it also implies a reduction to the intentional field of consciousness.17 in fact, everything that appears into our consideration does so insofar as it is assessed by this intentional field, which the epoché only takes out of its anonymity. by being faithful to this epoché, we do not make conjectures about what appears; we only describe what appears before the intentional field through constituent acts. if anything is to possess phenomenological validity, then a constituent act is required. this is what commitment to the epoché means: being faithful to the phenomenological reduction by always asking for the constituent act of the object in question.18 later in his endeavor, husserl again describes perception under the new concepts reviewed in the section above. after we commit to epoché, we develop a consciousness that points to objects in a completely equal correlation, where the object is neither created by the subject nor exists in a partial transcendence. therefore, now the description of perception, reduced to the intentional field of consciousness, no longer risks becoming either subjectivism or realism. therefore, perception will be constituted by three stages: hyletic, noetic and noematic. the hyletical stage refers to hylé as the basic matter of perception; namely, the pure sensation that makes no 14 edmund husserl, ideas: general introduction to pure phenomenology (routledge, 2014). 15 ibid., 110. 16 ülker öktem, “husserl’s evidence problem,” indo-pacific journal of phenomenology 9, no. 1 (may 1, 2009): 3, https://doi.org/10.1080/20797222.2009.11433986. 17 steven crowell, “phenomenological immanence, normativity, and semantic externalism,” synthese 160, no. 3 (2008): 339. 18 husserl, ideas, 364. 79issue vi ◆ spring 2019 patočka's critique of husserl reference to any object whatsoever, in the purely experienced sensation.19 in this sense, it consists of a cogitatio that is a mere ingredient of consciousness, where the ingredient is what makes the private current20 of the subject’s experiences. this purely immanent hylé is later animated by noesis, which is the stage in which the purely experienced becomes a trait of a thing.21 for example, the pure green becomes the green of a leaf. in this stage hylé no longer makes reference to itself, but instead points towards an object. in this stage, intentionality starts operating and allows consciousness to get outside of itself. finally, noesis allows the noema to enter, which is the pointed object donated by an intuition.22 in the noetical moment, we point to the object, which by means of intuition, then allows the object to make itself present in the noematical stage. we can even describe falsity and truth within this schema: i can point noetically towards something that does not present itself noematically. in other words, i prepend a signification that does not correspond to the given intuition. only when the signification is filled with a corresponding intuition does the constitution of the object become successful.23 although the former description underlies an effort to attribute equal importance to the subject and object roles respectively, it probably seems that the object is given only by means of acts of consciousness. thus, it becomes dubious if things that appear to the subject are transcendent to it. there is a chance that everything will be components of consciousness. husserl solves the issue by introducing the concept of foreshortening.24 there’s a substantial difference between merely immanent experiences and proper perceptions. immanent experiences are given in a completely adequate way to the subject; they are conceived in a completely transparent way.25 in other words, the thing is immediately and completely ended in all its possibilities of being perceived by the subject. perceptions, on the other hand, are always only shown partially; one can never end all the possible perspectives that the object has to offer.26 this means that perceptions are given inadequately. this foreshortened way of being brought into presence guarantees its exteriority since “an experience is only possible as a living experience but not as anything spatial.”27 19 patrick whitehead, “phenomenology without correlationism: husserl’s hyletic material,” indo-pacific journal of phenomenology 15, no. 2 (october 26, 2015): 6, https://doi.org/10.1080/20797222.2015.1101830. 20 by ‘private current’ i mean the subject’s own flow of consciousness that is available only to himself. his thoughts, emotions, mental images and other things in motion constitute this private current. 21 kenneth williford, “husserl’s hyletic data and phenomenal consciousness,” phenomenology and the cognitive sciences 12, no. 3 (september 1, 2013): 502, https://doi.org/10.1007/s11097-013-9297-z. 22 ibid. 23 lambert zuidervaart, “synthetic evidence and objective identity: the contemporary significance of early husserl’s conception of truth,” european journal of philosophy 26, no. 1 (2018): 125, https://doi.org/10.1111/ ejop.12192. 24 the original term for this mode of appearance is abschattung, and it refers to things that are given as not showing all of its sides. the reference painting tries to portray the idea of an unfinished sketch or perspective. renaud barbaras, introducción a una fenomenología de la vida: intencionalidad y deseo (encuentro, 2013), 43. 25 juha himanka, “husserl’s two truths: adequate and apodictic evidence,” phänomenologische forschungen, 2005, 93. 26 maría paredes, “percepción y atención. una aproximación fenomenológica,” azafea: revista de filosofía; vol. 14 (2012), 2014, 84–85, http://revistas.usal.es/index.php/0213-3563/article/view/11680. 27 husserl, ideas, 41. 80 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college here, the distinction between acts and contents is raised again: even though the thing is given through multiple and different foreshortenings, it nevertheless points towards a unique object. perception is already accompanied by the realization that the perspectives refer to the same object. we do not need to complete all the possible perspectives, nor do we need the mediation of a secondary abstraction or to provide a metaphysical explanation for this realization. in other words, the unity of the object is already given in perception by the many perspectives. this is called apprehension unity.28 both the possibility of the unity of the object and the foreshortened exteriority guarantee that things are not created by the subject. however, this is not a completely transcendent transcendence29 in the sense that does not imply the independent existence of a world, but, rather, it implies exteriority for the intentional consciousness. in this sense, the external constitutes a transcendence inside immanence,30 which is verified thanks to unprejudiced scrutiny of appearance that, therefore, it is inclined neither towards the subjectivist idealist thesis nor the realism of things in themselves. iii. patočka’s critique we must emphasize that, for husserl, in the act of perception, only experiences are components of consciousness. perception as such, however, including the foreshortenings and apprehension of unity, has an objective character. this betrays, according to patočka, the explanation that husserl himself proposed as a distinction for experiences and perception. husserl says that the foreshortened donation of things guarantees the external character, and, so, everything that is given adequately constitutes consciousness’ components. indeed, foreshortenings are given to the subject as empirical data, which lacks signification. but in the case of what is also supposed to be given as objective—namely the apprehension of unity—the donation is neither forefronted nor empirical data, “but apprehension itself is affirmed; it is not any affluence of new sensations, but it has the character of an act, a mode of consciousness or a state of the spirit.”31 since apprehension itself does not correspond to any proper intuition and is nothing empirical, one must conclude that constitutes signification itself. as such, it has the character of being an act of the subject and appears with the same apodictic evidence that is characteristic of the subjective experience. therefore, apprehension taken as such corresponds to an adequate 28 smith, “husserl and externalism” 326. 29 by ‘transcendent transcendence,’ i mean that the objectivity or externality of the thing has to resort to something that is beyond (or outside of ) consciousness. this is why it is a ‘transcendent transcendence’, and is directly opposed to ‘immanent transcendence’ (a husserlian notion), which assures the externality of the thing without resorting to something beyond consciousness. 30 dermot moran, “immanence, self-experience, and transcendence in edmund husserl, edith stein, and karl jaspers,” american catholic philosophical quarterly, may 1, 2008, 268, https://doi.org/10.5840/ acpq20088224. 31 jan patočka, el movimiento de la existencia humana (encuentro, 2004), 103. 81issue vi ◆ spring 2019 patočka's critique of husserl experience (not a foreshortened one) so that there is nothing indicating its external or objective character: to summarize: sensations and the acts that apprehend them or perceive them are lived, but they do not appear objectively; they are not seen, heard or perceived with any «sensory faculty». we have before our eyes husserl’s subjectivism in germinal state.32 these critiques demystify the supposedly objective character of apprehension of unity and, therefore, it loses its status as a perception, since apprehension is not an intuition of anything, but an act of signification, void of any empirical content. in light of this, apprehension enters the field of what constitutes consciousness, assuming we are faithful to husserl’s own explanation: subjective being does not foreshorten, it merely shows itself as what it is. therefore, in the first place, the phenomenical sphere is divided into two stages: what appears in its modes of being given, on one hand, and the supposed subjective basis of this appearance, on the other hand.33 in his project, husserl restarts the former conception of consciousness, which is characterized by considering the subjective modes of being as intramental and the objective as extramental—or, in husserlian terms, what is component and what is spatiotemporal. though patočka doesn’t explicitly elucidate how this critique affects the noema/noesis schema, it can be easily understood. noesis as such is not empirical; it is an animation of data that imbues noema/noesis with the capacity to have a direction towards an object. due to this lack of empirical data—and the possibility of being foreshortened—one concludes that noesis is an adequate experience, a component. noesis, thus, takes the side of the subjective (and noema of the objective), and the appearing process splits in two again. finally, this confusion irradiates to hyletical data, since one cannot determine if they are components or foreshortenings. there are two equally probable answers: hyletical data are either foreshortened perspectives that acquire signification thanks to noesis, or they are components of consciousness that become externally directed thanks to noesis. the aforementioned misunderstandings and contradictions rest, however, in a more fundamental mistake, according to patočka. the great achievement of husserl is, indeed, the discovery of the “phenomenological field” and the birth of describing the appearance as such in that field, but: it is true here that husserl has not abandoned the fundamental idea of a general correlation between appearances and what appears, he has even reinforced and elevated the entire philosophical endeavor to the methodical. however, a curious combination of cartesian and kantian ideas alongside the original idea of an intuitive foundation of knowledge 32 ibid. 33 ibid., 105. 82 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college that transcends argumentation lead here to the idea of a phenomenological reduction to the pure immanence of consciousness.34 indeed, husserl tries to attend to appearances as such and to correlation, but when he tries to constitute this knowledge as a rigorous science, “he attempts, in a curious analogy with the cartesian concern with doubt, to methodically highlight and secure this dimension.”35 the procedure chosen to do this, for descartes, implies remitting to the apodictic dimension of the subject. in other words, the reduction to pure immanence is fundamentally an alternative term for the subjective, since it relies on an equal correlation of subject and object, and is thereby accompanied by the additional claim because it is an intentional field. but as was aforementioned, claiming its intentional nature does not solve the problem—the correlation of subject and object is always marked by the objectifying acts of the subject. this means that intentionality is only directed from the subject to the object, but not vice versa. all things considered, we find that the classical bifurcation of the world is accidentally replicated, now in the distinction between what is component and what is spatiotemporal. this is a dichotomy that intentionality alone cannot dissolve—it merely transports it. one could say that in order the prevent the claim of an in-itself world, husserl constantly refers to the appearance of the former only for a consciousness, but this has resulted in reducing appearances to the subjective experience, without considering the possibility that admitting that the autonomy of the phenomenical field is not equivalent to restarting the thesis of the thing in itself. the merely methodological commitment of evading the thing in itself started to slip into more serious claims of subjectivism. husserl, in fact, tries to describe appearances as such, and is aware that in order to describe the universal a priori of correlation, it is not possible to reduce appearances as such to any of the entities that appear in this field. that would imply the absurd claim that the appearance itself depends on the things that this field produces. however, in order to evade the thesis of the thing in itself, husserl relies excessively on the dimension of immanent consciousness, in which he finds that there is complete and indubitable evidence. so he ends up relying completely on the self: the intention points, therefore, to appearances as such, to the phenomenical sphere. but this intent is sketched in terms that come from the sphere of the subjective: he tries to speak about a reduction to pure immanence instead of putting on display the field of appearances as such.36 even though its initial motivation is always to stay true to the correlation, objectivity ends up being defined as “something that appears in living and is transcendent to 34 ibid., 114. 35 ibid., 106. 36 ibid. 83issue vi ◆ spring 2019 patočka's critique of husserl the ingredient stream of experiences.”37 in this way, the constitution of things— which claims to debunk that objects are created by consciousness or that things in themselves exist independently—is impossible if we do it from the presupposition that everything is put under the assessment of the immanence of intentional consciousness. it can be said, then, that this “transcendence inside immanence” fails: ultimately, the whole problem of constitution is irresolvable. how can ‘living as such’, as it is originally given in reflection, start to make something an objective, transcendent appearance? one cannot have intellectual evidence about it—it can only be accepted as a brute fact. nothing should be questioned about it if it were not, in fact, an ultimately intuitable fact, but rather, an authentic fact, and not a construction.38 indeed, husserl’s conjecture that the psychic is internal comes, according to patočka, from brentano’s interpretation of cartesianism: if the intentional object is not immanent but precisely transcendent to the subject, and the brentanian apprehension of the psychic as an internal object remains, then it follows, necessarily, that the fundamental distinction is between lived experience and phenomena. living experience does not appear, but is already there as a component that flows through time and causes the appearance of things. by virtue of living experiences transcendences appear.39 this means that the subjective (psychic) is not one of the many kinds of entities that appear by means of the appearance as such, but, rather, is a privileged dimension that is the cause of the appearance in general. by this mistake, the procedure of epoché is also misunderstood because it is presupposed that epoché implies a “reduction” to the immanence of the subject. this is based on the misguided belief that if consciousness is intentional, then it is no longer closed in itself because is only direction towards the object. however, this is not possible if the psychic/internal mode of conceiving it is not abandoned. if not abandoned, the transcendent and immanent restart the intramental/extramental distinction that it purports to overcome.40 iv. patočka’s proposal from the critique previously sketched, it is clear that the main attack resides in the understanding of the investigation of appearance as reduced to the immanence of consciousness. this produces all the problems that, in the end, are attributed to subjectivism. however, it is true that the investigation of appearances requires a 37 ibid., 107. 38 ibid., 108. 39 ibid., 124. 40 husserl pretended to demonstrate that sources of knowledge for phenomenology were not internal nor external biagio g. tassone, “the relevance of husserl’s phenomenological exploration of interiority to contemporary epistemology,” palgrave communications 3 (july 11, 2017): 8. 84 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college disconnect from any possible thesis about the world41 and must remain faithful only to describing appearance as such: […] phenomenology itself should be a science: an a priori science of the essential legalities that govern the appearance process of what appears as such […] it is not an argumentative basis that resorts to the self as the ultimate explicative concept, but a revealing foundation that legitimizes the idea of foundation as such.42 if phenomenology is supposed to be given the task of describing appearances as such, then this appearance cannot be based on one of the entities that appear, since that would require what is needed for explanation to reside within the explanation. from this point of view, both the subjective and the objective are things that made its presence in the phenomenological field as any other. this phenomenical field is, therefore, autonomous,43 it is the condition of possibility for the apparition of every entity, but this field itself is no entity. husserl’s mistake is reducing it to one of the entities that appear: there is a phenomenological field, a phenomenological being itself, which cannot be reduced to any entity that appears within it. therefore, it can never be explained by the entity, even if this is objective, as in nature, or subjective, as in the self.44 it follows that in order to describe appearances as such without biases, one must abstain from positing any thesis that we had with respect to appearance. that is precisely the role of the epoché, which “[…] claims that a thesis is neither attempted nor purported, but that one only experiences the freedom to use it or not to use it.”45 it does not follow, however, from this abstention, that one should commit to a “reduction”; this requirement is added by husserl in order to bring himself back to an indubitable sphere. in this sense, the reduction to the sphere of the self should actually be one of the theses that we should abstain ourselves from positing. thanks to this way of thinking about the epoché, patočka considers the possibility of posing a new question: “what would happen if the epoché did not stop before the thesis of the own self, but was understood as completely universal?”46 if epoché becomes completely universal now, it can open the way for ‘appearance itself ’ to make its appearance, without the obstacles of taking it as being originated from the self. in fact, “maybe the immediacy of the donation of the self is not a prejudice and the experience of one’s own self, just as the experience of external things, has its a priori, 41 oded balaban, “epoché: meaning, object, and existence in husserl’s phenomenology,” in phenomenology worldwide: foundations — expanding dynamics — life-engagements. a guide for research and study, ed. a. ales bello et al. (dordrecht: springer netherlands, 2002), 111, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-0473-2_10. 42 patočka, el movimiento de la existencia humana, 113. 43 dušan hruška, “patočka and english sensualism and its place in modern philosophy,” folia philosophica 37, no. 0 (july 4, 2016): 28, http://www.journals.us.edu.pl/index.php/folia/article/view/4732. 44 patočka, el movimiento de la existencia humana, 129. 45 ibid., 244. 46 ibid., 247. 85issue vi ◆ spring 2019 patočka's critique of husserl an a priori that allows the appearance of the self.”47 so, if we make epoché universal, we gain two things at once: freeing ‘appearances as such’ from the chains of the self and, by doing so, revealing the authentic essence of this previously misunderstood self. if we want to unfold this a priori, which is a condition for the possibility of the subjective as well as the objective, then we must universalize epoché in such a way that “it is a phenomenology void of reduction, but not without the epoché.”48 in other words, it is an a-subjective phenomenology. this renouncement of reduction now allows us to open the phenomenological field as such, as an autonomous a priori, to whom objects and subjects appear on the same grounds: “we arrive in this way to the conditions of possibility of the appearance of what already appears; we do not remain quiet before what appears, but we allow appearance to make its appearance.”49 this phenomenological field is no longer a mere stream of experiences, but a world-background, a vast horizon of meaning that only manifests, shows and bring things to presence: a universal structure of appearance that is not reducible to what appears, in its singular being, is what we call world, which we have the right to name, since it is found in the epoché. however, it is neither negated nor doubted by the epoché, but brought into the light, and out of anonymity, by it.50 thanks to an epoché void of reduction, appearances as such can be unfolded, showing itself as a proto-horizon of the world “in an infinity that cannot be updated. perception does not flow in a sequence of more and more perceptual donations, but, from the beginning, it rests on a totality that is present even when is not being perceived.”51 in other words, a particular actualization of that horizon of totality does not account, on its own, for the fact that there is something. this, however, is already manifested by the fact that “the universal totality of what appears, which patočka sometimes calls ‘unapparent immensity,’ belongs to the own structure of appearance, which means that every appearance is necessarily a co-appearance of that totality.”52 every particular appearance presupposes this infinite world background as the condition of its possibility in such a way that one must conclude that this world is neither objective nor subjective, but a-subjective. this way of conceiving the world allows patočka to formulate an original conception of the subject. patočka points to descartes as the discoverer of the cogito, which is the subject revealed to itself by means of its own acts, through its existence.53 descartes 47 ibid. 48 ibid., 249. 49 ibid., 247. 50 ibid., 248. 51 ibid., 29. 52 barbaras, introducción a una fenomenología de la vida, 139. 53 jan patočka, “the natural world and phenomenology,” in jan patočka: philosophy and selected writings (chicago: university of chicago press, 1989), 247. 86 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college attempts to add a thing-like essence (a thing that acts, thinks, and wants),54 in such a way that constitutes a special thing between other things that lack a self or ego. this introspectionalist55 way of conceiving the object motivates him to consider the subject as something internal, a closed-in-itself ego to which external objects oppose is inherited by brentano,56 and, finally, by husserl. instead of this ego, patočka will emphasize the cogito: without a doubt, the ‘ego’ as ‘ego cogito’ is proven to be immediately true. but this certainty lacks any content, except for this: it is that which appears that makes its appearance. the phenomenological field appears before this ego.57 this does not mean, however, that the cogito is the foundational entity of appearance, because as we have already said, appearance cannot be reduced to any entity. what patočka is trying to say is that the subject acts only as an organizational center58 of this protohorizon of world. the subject is, in some way, the indexical of appearance—the ‘here’ of appearance.59 it indicates the direction of the appearance, but appearance always ontologically precedes the subject and presents itself before him, not through him: showing itself in him is no human doing: man neither produces nor shows its own being (its own ‘light’) or its own transparency, the interest for it or its own comprehension. in one’s own being, being in general is already in action.60 now, the essential features of the subject become available through phenomenological description. by means of this, we discover that the subject is an entity in the world whose fundamental ontological feature is that it “cares for its being and exists through time and in movement. this points even beyond the sphere of the self.”61 this entity lives within the possibilities of appearance and clings to them in its existence, in such a way that its being is explained by the phenomenical field, but not the other way around.62 thanks to this conception of the subject and appearance, now patočka can replace the husserlian account of perception with his own corrections. in patočka’s account, it is not the case that different perspectives appear and then are unified by an act of 54 rené descartes, meditations on first philosophy: with selections from the objections and replies (oup oxford, 2008), 20. 55 ibid., 97-98. 56 dermot moran, “the inaugural address: brentano’s thesis,” proceedings of the aristotelian society, supplementary volumes 70 (1996): 2. 57 patočka, el movimiento de la existencia humana, 129. 58 ibid., 248. 59 indexicals are terms that have a demonstrative function, namely, they indicate direction, place, position, etc, relative to a context or point of reference. paradigmatic cases are “here” and “now”. david kaplan, “demonstratives,” in themes from kaplan, ed. joseph almog, john perry, and howard wettstein (oxford: oxford university press, 1989), 490. 60 patočka, el movimiento de la existencia humana, 110. 61 ibid., 111. 62 barbaras, introducción a una fenomenología de la vida, 157. 87issue vi ◆ spring 2019 patočka's critique of husserl consciousness. what is actually the case is that before me appear characteristics that “i attribute to the thing itself as its own notes and others that, although they are also there, they are not there as belonging to the thing, but, in some way, as helping the thing appear.”63 some of the data exist as a property of the thing and belongs, and the rest of the data lack reference to that thing, which is not a property of the thing itself. this means that two types of data, which are equally objective, appear to me, at least in the sense that they are different to me. however, some of it appears with confusing traits, or lacks reference to its object. characters that appear as belonging to a thing are thing-like traits, and the ones that lack reference to its object are nonthing-like traits. thing-like and non-thing-like traits are just as objective, and for non-thing-like characters to become thing-like characters, an act of the subject is not necessary. patočka compares this to the image of awakening from a dream, in which even “before what is being lived shows contours of things to me, sensations overwhelm me as i am passively taken by them. does not something very different to things appear there; namely, a chaos, a fog, but all of that in an objective way?”64 finally, the noesis/noema scheme is also corrected. as we saw before, this scheme implies putting beforehand an empty signification (noesis) that needs to be corresponded by an intuition (noema). the mistake here is to consider this empty signification as an act of the subject, instead of as a structure of a-subjective appearance. what is actually the case is that there is a universal structure of emptiness/fulfillment that is not limited only to perception, and is not an act of any subject, but always operates every time a negative meaning is asking to be completed: “it can also happen that any object, existent thing, or thing-like process fails to appear.”65 conclusion i have demonstrated that patočka’s critique (and many of the subjectivist accusations made towards husserl) can be held, since they reveal many presuppositions that operate in the background of husserlian theories of appearance. the fundamental conclusion from this critique is that the epoché does not imply reduction. thus, we can envision an a-subjective phenomenology that reveals the independence of a world-horizon without restarting the natural attitude towards the world. nonetheless, this correction to husserl’s project is not a mere disregarding, but is, rather, a correction that keeps and shows the true aspect of many of husserl’s theories. in a certain way, we can see patočka as an inheritor who critically continues the task started by the first phenomenologist. patočka expresses this intent, saying that: 63 patočka, el movimiento de la existencia humana, 126. 64 ibid. 65 ibid., 132. 88 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college maybe the last will of the creator of phenomenology should be considered: effecting the catharsis of the phenomenological and giving back to phenomenology its original sense of an investigation of appearances-assuch.66 ◆ bibliography balaban, oded. “epoché: meaning, object, and existence in husserl’s phenomenology .” in phenomenology world-wide: foundations — expanding dynamics — life-engagements. a guide for research and study, 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amsterdam university press, 2014. kant, immanuel. critique of pure reason. edited by paul guyer and allen w. wood. cambridge: cambridge university press, 1999. kaplan, david. “demonstratives.” in themes from kaplan, edited by joseph almog, john perry, and howard wettstein, 481–563. oxford: oxford university press, 1989. moran, dermot. “immanence, self-experience, and transcendence in edmund husserl, edith stein, and karl jaspers.” american catholic philosophical quarterly, may 1, 2008. https://doi.org/10.5840/acpq20088224. ———. “the inaugural address: brentano’s thesis.” proceedings of the aristotelian society, supplementary volumes 70 (1996): 1–27. öktem, ülker. “husserl’s evidence problem.” indo-pacific journal of phenomenology 9, no. 1 (may 1, 2009): 1–14. https://doi.org/10.1080/20797222.2009.11433986. paredes, maría. “percepción y atención. una aproximación fenomenológica.” azafea: revista de filosofía; vol. 14 (2012), 2014. http://revistas.usal.es/index. php/0213-3563/article/view/11680. patočka, jan. el movimiento de la existencia humana. encuentro, 2004. ———. “the natural world and phenomenology.” in jan patočka: philosophy and selected writings, 239–74. chicago: university of chicago press, 1989. schrader, george alfred. “philosophy and reflection: beyond phenomenology.” the review of metaphysics 15, no. 1 (1961): 81–107. smith, a. david. “husserl and externalism.” synthese 160, no. 3 (2008): 313–33. smith, david woodruff. “phenomenology.” in the stanford encyclopedia of philosophy, edited by edward n. zalta, summer 2018. metaphysics research lab, stanford university, 2018. https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2018/entries/ phenomenology/. tassone, biagio g. “the relevance of husserl’s phenomenological exploration of interiority to contemporary epistemology.” palgrave communications 3 (july 11, 2017): 17066. whitehead, patrick. “phenomenology without correlationism: husserl’s hyletic material.” indo-pacific journal of phenomenology 15, no. 2 (october 26, 2015): 1–12. https://doi.org/10.1080/20797222.2015.1101830. 90 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college williford, kenneth. “husserl’s hyletic data and phenomenal consciousness.” phenomenology and the cognitive sciences 12, no. 3 (september 1, 2013): 501–19. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11097-013-9297-z. zahavi, dan. husserl’s phenomenology. stanford university press, 2003. zuidervaart, lambert. “synthetic evidence and objective identity: the contemporary significance of early husserl’s conception of truth.” european journal of philosophy 26, no. 1 (2018): 122–44. https://doi.org/10.1111/ ejop.12192. 91issue vi ◆ spring 2019 δι αν οι α review of discomfort and moral impediment ( julio cabrera)1 myles casey, ph.d. student the pennsylvania state university julio cabrera opens discomfort and moral impediment by announcing his intention to cohere into a single philosophical system two regions of investigation that are often sequestered from one another in ethical treatises: a structural analysis of the human situation within the world, and the investigation into “the very possibility of morality and of a morality of procreation in particular,” these investigations informing, respectively, cabrera’s bifurcation of the book (viii). the first part presents a structural and ontological framework, out of which cabrera can derive, and ground, the practical and moral conclusions that he defends in the second. cabrera believes that this move places his articulation of antinatalism on surer footing than those of other antinatalist authors—in particular, david benatar—and as being more capable of responding to objections from both pro-natalist and “affirmative-ethical” theorists. cabrera’s overarching project throughout the book is to dislodge procreation from what he claims to be “its usual position as a mere ‘natural act,’ or as an obviously ethical act, or even as the most ethical of all acts” (ibid). methodologically, cabrera freely utilizes various aspects of the “continental” and “analytical” traditions of western philosophy. from just a cursory glance at the book: in the first part’s structural analysis of the human situation, cabrera draws on heidegger, schopenhauer, sartre, and nietzsche, placing them into dialogue with the hispanophone 1 julio cabrera, discomfort and moral impediment: the human situation, radical bioethics, and procreation, (newcastle upon tyne: cambridge scholars publishing, 2019), 280pp., £61.99(hbk), ibsn 9781527518035. 92 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college philosophers, josé ortega y gasset, enrique dussel, and fernando savater. throughout his work, cabrera manages to tactfully appropriate these existential arguments within an unmistakably “analytic” organizational structure, making use of “informal logic” (as cabrera, himself, remarks) in deducing his ontological and normative conclusions. these conclusions are, in turn, in contradiction to those of benatar, kant, singer, dworkin, tooley, and nagel (to name just a few). thematically, part i begins with a brief outline of what cabrera contends to be the most basic principle of traditional ethics, the “minimal ethical articulation (mea).” the mea is operative as the most basic, yet ultimately non-binding, aspect of the traditional ethics and acts as a “minimal demand” to consider, in the planning of our own life projects, the interests, feelings, and life projects of others, only insofar as theses others, too, consider the interests, feelings, and projects of others (2-3). this demand of the mea, cabrera argues, has priority over respecting the autonomy of others, helping, and refraining from harming others because we may encounter another whose interests, feelings, and projects are such that we should not respect their autonomy and should actively impeded the fulfillment of their projects (4-5). cabrera then turns to more ontological considerations of human being, in chapters 2 and 3, to articulate his concept of “negative ethics,” the question of discomfort, and the status of “value” in human life. the concept of “negative ethics,” in contradistinction to what he calls the “affirmative ethics” of traditional moral philosophy, is integral to cabrera’s book, and this distinction is concomitantly developed alongside his structural arguments regarding the human situation in the first part, and presented as an alternative ethical framework in his arguments against procreation in the second. cabrera’s articulation of “negative ethics” in chapter 2 serves as a prolegomenon to his antinatalist theses throughout part ii, and contends that it cannot be taken as self-evidently true that there is inherent value to human life—its truthfulness can only be established through a “slow and careful process of argumentation” (10). if it is not self-evidentially true, and has not been defended through rigorous argumentation, cabrera argues that he is licensed to advance the opposite thesis: “[…] human life carries something like an initial structural disadvantage […]that human life initially presents a valueless character or a ‘lack of value,’ not in the agnostic sense of not being ‘good or bad’ but in the sense of carrying from the outset an adverse value” (10-11). the remainder of the second chapter presents a series of easily refutable, foil arguments in support of the adverse value of human.2 the inconclusiveness of these approaches necessitates cabrera’s ontological framing arguments in chapters 3-5. at the beginning of the third chapter, cabrera presents 2 in brief, the five non-structural arguments are the following: [1] that people suffer on a daily basis, both in mundane (e.g., a heartburn) and severe (e.g., torture) ways; [2] that many in the history of philosophy have portrayed the human life and the world as something degenerate that, through moral struggle, we can restore or overcome; [3] that humans, through metaphysics and religion, have often imagined an idyllic world to make suffering their current one bearable; [4] that a human life is not irreplaceable and that we can, in time, ‘forget’ about a deceased loved one; [5] that humans, generally, need the value and recognition of others in order to have a sense of self-worth, rather than produce it endogenously, demonstrates only an extrinsic value to life, and not an intrinsic one (11-21). 93issue vi ◆ spring 2019 review of discomfort and moral impediment (julio cabrera) human being as having a non-exhaustive trifold structure—[a] human life, from birth has a “decaying” structure that can end at any point; [b] human life’s decaying-being is characterized by three kinds of “frictions’—physical pain, discouragement (i.e., the possibility of “lacking the will” to continue to be), and “exposure to the aggressions of other humans”; [c] the ability to react against the two aforementioned structural aspects by “positive value creation” (23). cabrera calls this trifold structure of human being the “terminality of being” (24). in support of his concept of the “terminality of being,” cabrera formulates what he terms the “ser/estar distinction”: both are spanish infinitives for the verb, ‘to be,’ the former, however, denoting a more ‘essential,’ structural, permanent sense of ‘to be,’ pertaining to “the being of life,” whereas the former denotes the more particularized, impermanent, and circumstantially contingent ways of being within the ‘overarching’ structure of life (27-28). at this point, one would not be remiss to immediately call to mind heidegger’s ontological difference, which cabrera does reference, but subsequently attempts to differentiate from his ser/estar by citing the incongruity between the spanish and german words for being (ibid). cabrera’s insistence that the ser/estar distinction is not heidegger’s ontological difference is, however, specious. in his discussion of the role of death, cabrera formulates the dual concepts of “deathestar” and “death-ser” that serve functions to heidegger’s ontical and ontological death (30).3 further, in chapter 4, cabrera conceptualizes the “intra-structural” (i.e., estar) “reactive” creation of positive values (35), which he later describes as a type of “flight” from the terminality of being (140), mirrors heidegger’s analysis of the existential mode of dasein’s being-in-the-world as “falling prey” or as “entanglement” [verfallen] in §38 of being and time.4 the ser/estar distinction is, for cabrera, a necessary condition for the structural discomfort argument, and for much of the remainder of the book. it allows him to maintain that, on the structural level of the being of human life (ser), there can be an “adverse value” to life, i.e., no positive value whatsoever, and yet, on the individuated level of estar, a human being can actively create positive values—a phenomenon that cabrera describes as “living a double life” (30). every activity and thing that does, or can, appear as valuable to a human being is only on account of this reactive activity of positive value creation on the estar-level of life. turning to consider ethics within this structural framework, cabrera defines, in chapter 5, “moral impediment” as “the structural impossibility of acting in the world without harming or manipulating someone at some given moment (not, of course, everyone at every moment)” (52). he offers three classification types of moral impediment, but, most importantly, all forms of moral impediment are structured according to a 3 cabrera describes death-estar as “the kind of death that happens to us on a certain date from which we ‘cease to exist’,” and death-ser as “more directly tied to birth,” and as “a kind of ‘structural death,’ the gradual death that encompasses our ‘lives,’ the structural decaying due to frictions (pain, discouragement, moral impediment), and finally de [death-estar]” (30). compare this with the heidegger’s analysis of ontological death in relation to dasein’s care, angst, being-toward-death, and finite transcendence and the parallelism becomes apparent. 4 martin heidegger, being and time, trans. joan stambaugh, ed. dennis schmidt (albany: suny press, 2010), p. 169 [s.z., 175]: “idle talk, curiosity, and ambiguity characterize the way in which dasein is its ‘there,’ the disclosedness of being-in-the-world, in an everyday way. as existential determines, these characteristics are not objectively present in dasein; they constitute its being. in them and in the connectedness of their being, a basic kind of the being of everydayness reveals itself, which we call the entanglement [verfallen] of dasein.” 94 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college complex, enmeshed web of actions wherein “many [ethical] wrongdoings are reactions to previous moral impediments within a web” and therefore cannot be taken in isolation (56-57). the moral impediment thesis, perhaps the most significant argument of part i, articulates the structural analysis of the terminality of being and the ser/estar distinction within the project of negative ethics. in brief, any act of positive value creation, at the estar ‘level’ of human being, is never an isolated activity but one whose situation is always enmeshed within a larger complex of other human actions, thereby making it impossible to consider all of the feelings, interests, and projects of every other (61). therefore, cabrera concludes, the human situation is structured such that moral impediment is not accidental, but necessary with respect to all intra-structural actions (62). in part ii, cabrera works to extend and apply the ontological work of part i to the realm of normative ethics regarding the morality (or lack thereof ) of procreation, childhood education, sexuality, abortion, and suicide. though each chapter is thoughtprovoking, i will only focus on the question of procreation (in chapters 9-12), which cabrera describes as “the primary ethical question,” due to its centrality, both within this book and cabrera’s wider corpus of work (118). in defense of even calling to question the morality of procreation, cabrera frames the issue being “deeply motivated by a very strong and responsible concern for potential children, and for the risk that their emergence into being is the consequence of constraining and aggressive actions against defenseless human beings” (ibid). the act of procreation, cabrera maintains, is for the sake of the parents, and not the child, in order to give the parents some ‘good’— i.e., the joy, pleasure, or happiness of parenthood—which he describes as a mere act of the progenitor’s positive value creation, and one this is morally irresponsible given the aforementioned structures of the terminality of being and the moral impediment thesis (120). in chapters 10-12, cabrera develops what his calls the “proc thesis,” by recourse to two “minimal demands” of the mea. cabrera finds traditional ethical theory to contain the “do no harm demand” (nhd) and the “do not manipulate demand” (nmd) (126).5 cabrera’s proc thesis argues that, if the nhd and the nmd are indeed ethical demands, then procreation, as an intentional or unintentional act, is not ethically justifiable as it violates both the nhd and the nmd (121). he argues, first, that procreation is a manipulative activity, because procreation is an act of the progenitors’ creation of positive value, wherein the child is a means for that act’s satisfaction (129130). cabrera then argues that procreation is an inherently harmful act because: [1] the structure of life is terminal, and therefore birth is a structural “disadvantage;” [2] in flight from the terminal structure of their beings, humans inevitably cause harm to others in order to survive; and [3] there is no structural guarantor of successful reactive value creation, and, in fact, many humans fail in this endeavor (139-140). 5 roughly, cabrera explains the nhd and nmd as: assuming the reciprocity of consideration under the mea, we ought to pursue our projects, feelings, and interests only insofar as they do not harm any other, obstruct another’s own projects, or place any other in a situation of possible harm or constraint—when possible, we should actively try to rescue others from their situations of harm and constraint. further, we should not manipulate any other in service of our own ends. 95issue vi ◆ spring 2019 review of discomfort and moral impediment (julio cabrera) cabrera considers a variety of objections to the proc thesis, but directs most of his argumentative force against the position advocating an intrinsic value to life. here, again, he invokes the ser/estar distinction, arguing that the majority of these “affirmative” arguments “forget” this very distinction, and consequently mistake estarlevel value in human life to be demonstrative of structural, ser-level value to human life (143-151). further, cabrera argues that these same objectors erroneously conclude, from the impetus for survival driving the process of positive value creation, that there is a structural vitality to human being, rather than regarding it as “a mere question of animal impulse” (147). thirdly, even for “sensitive progenitors”—i.e., those who are cognizant of human life’s terminality, yet decide to have a child, in hopes that their child succeeds in positively resisting terminality(149-150)—procreation remains “one of the most powerful mechanisms of intra-world value creation, and therefore of postponing and distancing the terminal structure of being” (155). this, cabrera concludes, raises the fundamental question for ethics: do we have the right to procreate for the sake of our own resistance to our own inevitable decay of being (156)? though cabrera’s arguments in part i, and what has been discussed of part ii may appear to be formally valid, the project as a whole appears to be contingent upon the success of, or the reader’s assent to, the structural argument for the terminality of being and the incommensurability of positive value on the ‘estar-status’ to its ‘ser-status.’ at least as how i understand it, it would seem that the possibility for positive value creation at the level of a particularized human being is not operative at the structural level, and is therefore created ex nihilo in all individuated human beings. in the development of his proc thesis, cabrera states that he “agree[s] substantially” with the approach of “existential metaphysics,” in the tradition of schopenhauer, nietzsche, sartre, and heidegger, only insofar as they endorse the “idea that there are constant and regular structures of human life, and that it is not true that every human birth begins from nothing” (152). yet, here, there seems to be an explicit structural irregularity, or, at least, incongruity between the ser and estar designations of human being: how could it be the case that every human being is “forced” to engage in the creation of positive values without having any structural condition for the possibility of valuation, at all. on this question, heidegger, whose ontological work features prominently all throughout cabrera’s text, examines the fundamentally holistic being of human-being through its inseparable and non-distinct “multiplicity of constitutive structural factors,” which he calls “existentials.”6 above, i indicated the similarity between cabrera’s analysis of positive value creation and heidegger’s existential of falling prey [verfallen]. however, falling prey is the ontical modality of (i.e., estar-level), and presupposes, dasein’s ontological structure of sein-bei, translated as either “being together with” or “rendering things meaningfully present” in the world.7 in order to commit ourselves to the project of intra-structural (or innerworldly) positive value creation, there must first be, ontologically, the structural ability to encounter any-thing within the world 6 heidegger, being and time, pp. 53-54 [pp.53-54]. 7 the former translation appears in the stambaugh translation of being and time, whereas thomas sheehan offers the latter. see sheehan, making sense of heidegger: a paradigm shift, (lanham: rowan and littlefield pub., 2014), p. 150. 96 dianoia: the undergraduate philosophy journal of boston college as something that has been made meaningfully present to us, before we are able to appropriate these innerworldly beings into our projects. cabrera, in discussing the ser/ estar distinction, defined a third term, “estanes,” as the “beings that ‘are there’ (material things, ideas, films, animals, institutions or numbers),” that we use for the purposes of positive value creation (27). cabrera did not, however, locate the ontological possibility of our having these estantes as something meaningfully present and available to us, in the first place, nor, presupposing their meaningful presence, did he discuss why these estantes are even taken up within the process of positive value creation. on this account, then, it seems particularly odd that cabrera dismisses human being’s “animal desire” to live as something wholly incidental in relation to the structural determination of human being, and therefore lacking in any intrinsic value (161). on further consideration, this “animal desire” appears to be the only possible way of reconciling the problematic spontaneous generation of human being’s entire familiarity with the notion of “value” and relevance at the estar-level. yet this would cut against cabrera’s thesis that life is structurally valueless by admitting of an apparent structural regularity of organic vitality. if admitted, this structural feature would ground the human capacity for positive value creation in an original, value-laden relation that one has toward the being of one’s own life, which, therefore, hardly appears to be intrinsically valueless. this, however, appears to challenge cabrera’s original thesis—viz., that no thorough argumentation has been offered in support of the intrinsic value of human life—insofar as, now, the being of human life is the principle of value, or in other words, human life is structurally en-valuation, on which all consequent acts of particular value creation are contingent. thus, given the ontological structure of cabrera’s negative ethics, the aforementioned questions likely problematize cabrera’s normative ethical conclusions about procreation, without, of course, amounting to complete rejection thereof. ◆ 97issue vi ◆ spring 2019 δι αν οι α 98 c o n t r ib u t o r s natasha beaudin pearson mcgill university natasha beaudin pearson is a soon-to-be graduate of mcgill university, where she completed a joint honours b.a. in philosophy and art history. while her philosophical interests are wide-ranging, she has a particular fondness for the continental tradition, especially phenomenology, existentialism, feminist theory, and psychoanalytic theory. for her philosophy thesis, natasha examined freud’s seminal paper “mourning and melancholia” through the lens of existential anxiety, as it is conceived by heidegger in being and time. the aim of her essay was to problematize the reasons freud gives for positing a clear ontological distinction between “normal” mourning and “pathological” melancholia (the old term for clinical depression). in doing so, she sought to interrogate the bases on which our conceptions of mental health (and mental illness) are founded. a proud montrealer, she is currently having the time of her life travelling across argentina and chile. peter gavaris boston college peter gavaris is a senior at boston college finishing up a b.a. in english with a minor in film studies. over the course of his studies, his primary focus has been on modernist thought and expression across visual and literary arts, and accompanying critical theory from the likes of benjamin, agamben, and derrida. he has, likewise, developed an interest in cinema, with a particular infatuation with the films of abbas kiarostami. peter contributes regularly as the film critic for the heights, the independent student newspaper of boston college, and he supplements his journalistic endeavors with significant coursework on non-fiction writing and literature. this past summer, he worked with filmmaker rachel boynton on the production of a documentary on how the civil war and reconstruction are taught in american schools. he continues to remain interested in the role of aesthetic representation in both narrative and nonfiction works. brendan chambers boston college brendan chambers is currently a senior at boston college studying english and secondary education. his focus is in twentieth century american literature, and he is particularly interested in its intersection with philosophy and linguistics. he has recently completed a thesis that investigates how jack kerouac’s development and implementation of the spontaneous prose method laid the ideological foundation for the new journalism as a movement. brendan will be attending the university of north carolina chapel hill in pursuit of his phd in english in the fall, looking to continue and deepen his studies at the nexus of the language and philosophy. 99issue vi ◆ spring 2019 ryan cardoza stony brook university ryan cardoza is a junior studying philosophy at stony brook university. his philosophical areas of interest include the appearance/reality distinction (its condition of possibility and conceptual consequences), speculative metaphysics and the possibility thereof, and the problem of nihilism and its relation to knowledge. philosophers whom he finds particularly interesting and relevant to these problems include nietzsche, deleuze, kant, and plato. he is also interested in contemporary developments in realism and rationalism in continental philosophy, especially those influenced by deleuze. science is an interest as well, especially, but not limited to, the areas of chaos theory and complex systems. he is also a musician. maxwell wade rutgers university max wade is an undergraduate senior at rutgers university graduating in may 2019 with a ba in philosophy and political science. his research interests include marxism and communization theory, history of philosophy, and philosophy of religion with a specific focus on jewish and christian mysticism. his thesis was on the historical reception and interpretation of nietzsche's eternal return from heidegger to the present. after graduation he plans to pursue a phd in philosophy at boston college. gabriel vidal pontifical catholic university of chile gabriel vidal quinones is a student at the pontifical catholic university of chile. he began his academic career with an interest in living beings, i.e., biology. however, his interests have shifted from the empirical to the conceptual. yet, he stays within a realm of interconnected themes—his interests include the metaphysics of individuation, mereology, ontology, and the epistemology of bioethics (especially relating to environmental issues and technology), and phenomenology. he is at work on a dissertation on the thought of arne naess, the father of deep ecology and spinoza. specifically, he is investigating how the metaphysics and epistemology of the latter influenced the former—a work that encompasses well gabriel’s wide-ranging interests. dianoia fosters open philosophical discussion and writing among undergraduate students. the journal is committed to providing the opportunity for intellectual reflection that bridges the academic disciplines in pursuit of holistic understanding. the ancient greek word ‘διανοια’ translates as ‘thought’ but connotes a discursive direction or search for a higher form of knowledge. we thus hope to direct philosophical discourse toward an intellectually rigorous level of thinking. dianoia is sponsored by the institute for the liberal arts and the philosophy department of boston college