Philosophical Works of the Late James Frederick Ferrier/Institutes of Metaphysic (1875)/Section 1/Proposition 22
PROPOSITION XXII.
THE CONTINGENT CONDITIONS OF KNOWLEDGE.
DEMONSTRATION.
A Contingent law of knowledge must, first of all, be defined. "A contingent law of knowledge is one which, although complied with in certain cases in the attainment of knowledge, is not enforced by reason as a condition which must be complied with wherever knowledge is to take place." Knowledge is thus possible under other conditions than the contingent laws to which certain intelligences may be subject: in other words, there is no contradiction in affirming that an intelligent being may have knowledge of some kind or other, without having such senses as we have. This being understood, the demonstration is as follows: Whatever conditions of knowledge may be conceived (without a contradiction) to be changed, leaving knowledge still possible, these, according to the definition, are contingent laws. But our five senses may be conceived (without a contradiction) to be changed, leaving knowledge (knowledge, of course, of a different character from that which we now possess) still possible. Therefore our senses are contingent conditions of cognition; they are not binding on intelligence necessarily and universally.
OBSERVATIONS AND EXPLANATIONS.
This proposition takes us out of necessary into contingent truth.1. This proposition takes us into a region quite different from that in which we have been hitherto expatiating. It takes us into the region of contingent truth—of truth, in regard to cognition, which might conceivably have been other than it is. Till now we have been dealing with necessary truth—of truth absolutely unalterable—of law binding universally. The twenty-one preceding propositions give expression to the necessary truths of reason,— the universal and unchangeable laws of knowledge,—the conditions without a compliance with which all cognition and all intelligence are impossible. They lay down the laws not simply of our knowing and of our thinking, but of all knowing and of all thinking.
It is introduced in order that the necessary may be separated from the contingent laws.2. In contrast to these laws, this proposition places before us the main contingent conditions of cognition—those to which we specially are subject—without declaring whether other intelligences may, as a matter of contingency, be subject to the same conditions or not. All that is affirmed is, that they are not necessarily bound by these laws, because we are not necessarily bound by them. The contingent laws are brought forward, in order that their separation from the necessary laws may be effected; for it is of the utmost importance that the two series should be clearly discriminated from each other. Accordingly, they are placed in the smelting-house of speculation, not on their own account, but in order to disengage them from the necessary laws with which they are invariably mixed up in our experience,—just as the founder places the ironstone in his furnace, not on account of the stone, but on account of the iron with which it is combined.
3. This analysis is indispensable, because the Why this analysis is indispensable.conclusion towards which the inquiry is advancing in the ontology, is the reasoned settlement of what absolutely exists. Now, two preliminary objections may be raised as a bar to any such attempt: first, it may be said that we are not entitled to predicate the absolute existence even of that which is known to us under the necessary laws; and, secondly, that we are still less entitled to predicate the absolute existence of that which is known to us under the contingent laws. The force of the former objection shall be considered more particularly hereafter. The force of the latter objection is at once conceded. Speculation, it is to be hoped, knows her business better than to ascribe an absolute Being either to the contingent laws of knowledge, or to anything which is known to us through their instrumentality. But in order to exhibit that for which a real and absolute existence is hereafter to be claimed, it is necessary that this should be disengaged from that for which no such existence is claimed; and in order to effect this disengagement, it is indispensable that the contingent laws of knowledge, and that which is known in virtue of them, should be distinguished from the necessary laws, and from that which is known by means of their operation.
4. In setting about this analysis, the reader is requested to observe that it is not one which he is What is required in setting about this analysis.required actually to perform, but only to understand the possibility of. No man, when he apprehends or thinks of the synthesis which subsists between himself and external things, can, in point of fact, leave his senses out of the estimate, or conceive them altogether changed; but he can surely understand that they might possibly be altered; in other words, that the synthesis of himself and things might possibly embrace other modes of apprehension than his five senses. How this should be, or what these other modes of apprehension might be, he cannot of course conceive; nor is he now called upon to conceive it. All that he is required to understand is the possibility that such a change should take place without rendering the attainment of knowledge altogether inconceivable; and, at the same time, to mark the impossibility of there being any knowledge in any quarter if the element called self and the law called self-consciousness were supposed to be discounted from the process, or exchanged for any other law.
The analysis is illustrated.5. This, then, being premised, the reader may obtain a distinct conception of the analysis by which the contingent are distinguished from the necessary laws of cognition, by attending to the following illustration: Let him suppose himself to be looking at something—a tree, for example: he will find that the true and total object of his mind, in this case, is himself-seeing-the-tree. But he might possibly have a cognisance of the tree, though his seeing of it were exchanged for some other sense. He might apprehend it by the way of touch. Therefore seeing is not absolutely essential to all cognition of the tree. Again, he might possibly have a cognisance of the tree though his touch were exchanged for some other sense. He might hear the rustling of its leaves. Therefore the sense of touch is not absolutely essential to all cognition of the tree. Again, he might still have some cognisance of it though his hearing were exchanged for some other sense. He might smell the fragrance of its blossoms. Therefore hearing is not absolutely essential to all cognition of the tree. Again, he might still have some cognisance of it though his sense of smell were exchanged for some other mode of apprehension. He might apprehend it through the sense of taste. Therefore the sense of smell is not absolutely essential to all cognition of the tree. In short, one and all of our present senses might be abolished, and, provided they were replaced by a set of different sense; our knowledge of the tree might be as perfect or more perfect than it now is. The senses therefore are conditions of cognition wholly contingent, and subject to possible variation; and hence, also, all that is made known to us through their means is wholly contingent, and subject to possible variation.
The analysis illustrated.6. Let these be now placed in contrast with the necessary condition of all knowledge to which expression was given in the first proposition of this system. Let the man, as before, suppose himself to be gazing on the tree. That which he is cognisant of is, as before, himself-seeing-the-tree. Let us now suppose the self which he is cognisant of to be exchanged for something else, and that some mode of apprehension different from self-consciousness comes into play—would the man, in that case, continue to have any cognisance of the tree? Certainly he would not. No cognition of the tree, or of anything else, would now be possible. Withhold any of a man's senses from his cognisance when he is conversant with external things, and he will still be able to apprehend them, provided you give him other modes of apprehension. But withhold a man's self from his cognisance when he is conversant with external things, and he shall not be able to apprehend them intelligently,—give him what substitute and what endowments you please in place of the self which has been withdrawn from his cognition. It is thus obvious that, while it is possible for intelligence to know things without knowing them by means of such senses as ours, inasmuch as it may know them in other ways of which we can form no conception, it is impossible for any intelligence to know them without being cognisant of itself at the same time. Hence self-consciousness is fixed as the necessary condition of all knowing—while the senses are fixed merely as the contingent conditions of some, i.e. of our, knowing.
It is unnecessary to carry the analysis into greater detail.7. This analysis might be carried out at much greater length by contrasting the present with the twenty-one preceding propositions; and by showing that while each of the latter expresses a law binding upon all intelligence, the former expresses merely certain laws which are binding upon our intelligence. But it is conceived that the reader's own penetration may enable him to make this comparison for himself, and to perceive that, without a compliance with the laws laid down in the previous propositions, no knowledge of any kind is possible: whereas, without a compliance with the conditions laid down in the present proposition, knowledge might very well take place, although it would be of a different character from that which we now possess. Knowledge might take place notwithstanding this non-compliance, because no contradiction is involved in the supposition that there should be an intelligent apprehension of things under other conditions than our five senses; but a contradiction is involved in the supposition that any kind of cognition should arise under a reversal of the laws specified in the twenty-one preceding propositions—all of which, as was remarked at the outset, are derivations from the primary law set forth in Proposition I.
How these remarks qualify the doctrine of the absolute given in Prop. XXI.8. The foregoing considerations tend to qualify, in certain respects, the doctrine of the known absolute which was broached in Proposition XXI. The absolute in our cognition is ourselves apprehending things by one or more of our five senses. But only one of the factors of this synthesis is definite and invariable—to wit, self: the other factors must be some thing or some thought, and some way of knowing it. But inasmuch as the particular constituents of cognition are variable and inexhaustible, as was explained in Prop. VI. Obs. 2, it is, of course, impossible for any system to declare what particular things, or what particular thoughts, or what particular modes of apprehension, shall, in all cases, enter into the synthesis of cognition. Hence all that we are entitled to predicate in regard to the absolute in all cognition is, that it is a synthesis consisting of a self (this alone is definite and nameable) and objects, or thoughts, and modes of apprehension of some kind or other (these being indefinite and unnameable). In other words, we are not entitled to give out as the absolute in all cognition a subject plus the particular things that we are cognisant of, and plus the particular senses which we have been endowed with—but only a subject plus some thing or thought, and plus some mode or modes of apprehension.
The absolute, however, is still object+subject. The main result of the epistemology.9. By these explanations, however, the constitution of the synthesis of all cognition is in no respect essentially altered. It still remains what it has been declared throughout this work to be—subject + object, the word object being used in the most general sense in which it can be employed to signify any thing, or thought, or state of mind whatsoever, of which any intelligence may be cognisant. And the conclusion which the epistemology gives out as its main result is, that this synthesis, or, as it may be also termed, the known absolute, is the only possible object which any intelligence can ever apprehend. Pursue the object of knowledge or of thought through all the metamorphoses which it may be conceived to undergo, and it will never turn up as anything but this—the unity of subject and object. Try to fix it as anything but this, and the attempt will invariably terminate in a contradiction.
Twenty-second counter-proposition.10. Twenty-second Counter-proposition.—"The senses are not more contingent than any of the other conditions of human knowledge. On the contrary, they are more indispensable to the attainment of knowledge than any of the other means with which human intelligence is provided, or than any of the other laws to which human intelligence is subject."
The chief point to be attended to in it.11. This counter-proposition expresses the loose opinion of ordinary thinking in regard to the superior claims of the senses to rank as necessary principles of cognition—an inadvertency which psychology has done little or nothing to correct. The chief circumstance to be attended to in connection with it is, that it records with approval an omission which has been exceedingly prejudicial to the interests of philosophy—the omission, namely, to signalise the distinction between the necessary and the contingent laws of cognition.
The cause of the errors of representationism pointed out.12. Much of the perplexity and inconclusiveness of speculative thinking is to be attributed to the want of this analysis. To this cause the errors of representationism[1] and the insufficiency of Berkeleianism are mainly to be ascribed. It was formerly remarked (Prop. XI. Obs. 10) that the doctrine of a representative perception is an obscure anticipation of the great law of all reason, which declares that nothing objective can be apprehended unless something subjective be apprehended as well. So far this system is true, and moves in a right direction. But the question is, What is the subjective part which must be apprehended whenever any objective counterpart is apprehended? Here it is that representationism goes astray. One part of the subjective contribution (the ego) enters necessarily into the constitution of cognition (a man must know himself along with all that he knows); another part of the subjective contribution (the senses) enters only contingently into the constitution of cognition (a man might possibly know things in other ways than those of seeing, touching, &c.) But the advocates of representationism, from being blind to this distinction, got entangled in a web of perplexity from which there was no extrication. They omitted to make out the analysis, and consequently they must be held either to have elevated the senses, considered as elements of cognition, to the same footing of necessity with the ego, or else to have reduced the ego, considered as an element of cognition, to the same footing of contingency with the senses. Whichever of these alternatives they may have adopted, the consequences were equally erroneous. If we suppose representationism to adopt the first alternative, and to hold that the senses are necessary to cognition—in other words, that no knowledge is possible except to an intelligence who is cognisant of such senses as we possess—in that case the material universe would be reduced to the predicament of a contradiction, if our senses were withdrawn. It would become absolutely unknowable; because, upon this supposition, such senses as ours must necessarily be known along with it. And the only mode in which we could conceive it to subsist as a non-contradictory thing in our absence, would be by thinking it in synthesis with some mind which apprehended it exactly as we apprehend it—namely, by the way of seeing, hearing, touching, &c. But this is a species of anthropomorphical ontology which revolts us, and which we are by no means prepared to accept; and we refuse to accept it, because the conclusion is not logically reached. Reason does not assure us that all knowledge is impossible except under such sensational conditions as we are subject to.
The same subject continued.13. Again, if we suppose representationism to adopt the second of these alternatives, and to hold that the ego is not a necessary, but is, like the senses, a mere contingent element of cognition—in other words, that knowledge is possible to an intelligence who is not cognisant of himself; in that case, the material universe would not be reduced to the predicament of a contradiction by the removal therefrom of every intelligent subject. It would still remain a knowable and intelligible thing, because upon this supposition no ego must necessarily be known or thought of along with it. But this is a species of materialistic ontology which revolts us as much as the other, and is fully more illogical. It assigns to matter an absolute and independent existence; and that step once taken, the descent into atheism is as inevitable (let people struggle against it as they please) as the gravitation of the stone towards the valley, when it has once been loosened from the overhanging mountain-top. But the ontology which assigns to matter per se an intelligible or non-contradictory existence, is founded on an abnegation of all the necessary principles of reason; and therefore the doctrine of a representative perception, if we suppose it to embrace the alternative now under consideration, or to hold that the subject is only contingently known along with the objects which it apprehends, is obnoxious to the justest censure.
The cause of Berkeley's errors pointed out.14. The system of Bishop Berkeley, also, was vitiated by the absence of this analysis, or by the neglect to distinguish the necessary from the contingent conditions of cognition. He falls into the error consequent on the adoption of the first of the alternatives just referred to. He saw that something subjective was a necessary and inseparable part of every object of cognition. But instead of maintaining that it was the ego or oneself which clove inseparably to all that could be known, and that this element must be thought of along with all that is thought of, he rather held that it was the senses, or our perceptive modes of cognition, which clove inseparably to all that could be known, and that these required to be thought of along with all that could be thought of. These, just as much as the ego, were held by him to be the subjective part of the total synthesis of cognition which could not by any possibility be discounted. Hence the unsatisfactory character of his ontology, which, when tried by the test of a rigorous logic, will be found to invest the Deity—the supreme mind, the infinite ego, which the terms of his system necessarily compel him to place in synthesis with all things—with human modes of apprehension, with such senses as belong to man—and to invest Him with these, not as a matter of contingency, but as a matter of necessity. Our only safety lies in the consideration—a consideration which is a sound, indeed inevitable, logical inference—that our sensitive modes of apprehension are mere contingent elements and conditions of cognition; and that the ego or subject alone enters, of necessity, into the composition of everything which any intelligence can know. By occupying this ground, we neither require, on the one hand, to invest the Deity with such senses as ours; nor, on the other hand, to assign to matter an existence irrespective of all intelligence. The weak points in Berkeley's system are these three: first, he missed, though only by a hairsbreadth, the reduction of matter per se to a contradiction—an achievement which, until it be effected, speculation can accomplish nothing; secondly, in consequence of his neglect to distinguish the necessary from the contingent laws of knowledge, he failed to show that the supreme mind which the compulsory reason forced him to place in union with the universe, was not necessarily subject to our sensible modes of apprehension; and thirdly, he was hampered at every turn, as all philosophers have hitherto been, by the want of an agnoiology, or systematic doctrine of ignorance. In other respects, and viewed as approximations to the truth, the speculations of this philosopher, whether we consider the beauty and clearness of his style, or the depth of his insight, have done better service to the cause of metaphysical science than the lucubrations of all other modern thinkers put together.
The main result of the epistemology.15. The main result of the epistemology has been already touched upon under this proposition in Observation 9. But a more expanded statement of this result will form no inappropriate termination to the first section of these Institutes. The main result of the epistemology is this: In answer to the question, What is knowledge or Knowing? It replies that all Knowing is the apprehension of oneself along with all that one apprehends. This cognisance of self in addition to whatever things, or thoughts, we may be cognisant of—this, and this alone, is knowledge. In answer to the question, What is known? it replies that object + subject—things or thoughts mecum—constitute the only object which it is possible for any intelligence to know: further, that this synthesis constitutes the only object which it is possible for any intelligence to conceive or think of; because there can be a conception only of that of which the type or pattern may possibly be given in cognition: further, that the only way in which it is possible for any individual intelligence to transcend his own consciousness of himself and things, is by conceiving the total synthesis of which he himself is conscious repeated or multiplied, either with or without certain variations; in other words, by conceiving other intelligences conscious of themselves in the same way in which he is conscious of himself, and cognisant of things either as he is cognisant of them, or in ways of which he is totally ignorant: no consciousness can transcend itself in any other way than this, without falling sheer over into the abyss of the contradictory: but the mode of transcendence which these Institutes contend for, as the only possible mode, is quite easy and legitimate, and is as satisfactory as any that could be desired; indeed much more satisfactory, both in itself and in its conclusions, than the contradictory transcendence of consciousness (the transcendence, namely, by which it is supposed to pass out of and beyond itself, and to lay hold of material things in a state of absolute secernment from itself) for which psychology usually contends: further, in answer to the question, What is absolutely unknown and unknowable? it replies that everything without a "me" known along with it, and that every "me" without a thing or thought known along with it, is absolutely unknown and unknowable; in other words, that the two factors (universal and particular) which are required to constitute every cognition, present nothing but contradictions to the mind when taken singulatim, or apart from one another.
The importance of this result.16. In each of the foregoing propositions either a contradictory inadvertency of ordinary thinking, or an erroneous deliverance of psychology—to which expression is given in the counter-propositions—is corrected and removed, while a necessary truth of reason is, in each case, substituted in their room. So far, at let, the system has fulfilled the pledge held out in the Introduction, § 47. And, on the whole, it is submitted that the result of this reasoned theory of knowledge, though sufficiently simple, is neither insignificant nor unsatisfactory. It can scarcely be regarded as unimportant, unless the conversion of the soul of man from darkness to light—from a blindness to an insight in regard to the true object of his knowledge—from contradictory to intelligible thinking—from apparent to real cognition—be held to be a trivial and undesirable transmutation. In the next section the ship of speculation is put upon a new tack. The great waters of Reason spread before her in a direction heretofore untraversed; and launching forth under a new impulsion,
"Ingens iterabimus æquor."
- ↑ In case any of our readers should be in doubt as to what is exactly meant by "representationism" it may be remarked, that this is the doctrine which holds that we are cognisant of external objects only in or through some subjective medium, called indifferently by the name of ideas, images, or species,—in other words, that we are cognisant of things only in, or along with, our own perceptions of them; an undeniable truth, in spite of the exertions which Dr Reid made to overthrow it (See Prop. XI. Obs. 9.)