Kant and Other Minds

Kant and the Problem of Other Minds

1. Introduction

In the preface to the B-edition of the 1st Critique, Kant writes: “No matter how innocent idealism may be held to be as regards the essential ends of metaphysics… 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” (Bxxxix). In this passage, Kant famously argues that we should be able to know – and not merely have faith – that an external world exists. In this paper, I examine how Kant would respond to an equally challenging skeptical worry, namely the problem of other minds. Is Kant as troubled by the problem of other minds as he is by external world skepticism? That is, like his reply to external world skepticism, does Kant provide a transcendental argument for the existence of other minds? Or does he think that it should be treated as a mere article of faith, just like the immortality of the soul, freedom, and God? Surprisingly, Kant’s views on this topic have been largely overlooked. I think this is unfortunate. In contrast to the existing scholarship, I show that Kant actually defends four different positions on the problem of other minds. First, I discuss a skeptical approach that Kant takes in the Lectures in Metaphysics L1. Second, I discuss a more empirical approach that Kant takes in the 2nd Paralogism.  Third, I discuss what seems to be a transcendental argument for other minds defended in the 3rd Paralogism.  Fourth and lastly, I discuss regarding other minds as a matter of ‘moral faith’. In the concluding section of the paper, I evaluate the pros and cons of each approach.  In the end, I argue that while Kant has a lot more to say about the problem of other minds than most scholars typically recognize, none of his solutions seem ultimately satisfactory.

2. The Skeptical Approach: Other Minds in the Lectures

What is the problem of other minds? Generally speaking, it is a worry about whether other people have minds like our own. Most of us naturally believe that others have inner mental lives – that they experience the world, have feelings, thoughts, pleasures, pains, etc. – and we feel justified ascribing mental states to them. The question, however, is not whether we can correctly know another person’s thoughts or feelings. Instead, it is whether we can be rationally justified in believing that they have any at all. While we have a “privileged” first-person access to our own thoughts, we have at best indirect access to the inner mental lives of others. Seen this way, the problem of other minds generates a deep epistemological worry: How can we be rationally justified in believing that other minds even exist?

In the Lectures on Metaphysics L1 Kant acknowledges this epistemological problem. Indeed, these lectures written in the mid-1770’s are one of the few places where Kant ever explicitly addresses the problem of other minds. In his account of rational psychology, Kant discusses the nature of human beings in contrast with “other thinking natures” (28:271). Human beings are composed of (1a) a physical body and (1b) a self-conscious thinking nature. Animals are similar to human beings insofar as they have (2a) a physical body and (2b) are conscious, that is, they have sensory representations. However, they lack (2c) self-consciousness or, as Kant puts it, “the concept of the ‘I’”. Therefore have neither understanding nor reason (28:276). By contrast, angelic beings or spirits are similar to human beings insofar as they have (3a) a self-conscious thinking nature. But they differ insofar as (3b) they are purely immaterial, that is, they exist without a physical body.

Kant argues that we can only problematically assume the existence of angels (28:278). He offers two reasons why. First, it goes beyond any possible experience to know whether thinking natures in general can exist independently of physical bodies (28:277-278). Second and more importantly, spiritual beings themselves can never be an object of cognition, either of outer sense or of inner sense. With respect to outer sense, Kant explicitly writes:   “They [spiritual beings] are no object of outer sense, thus they are not in space” (28:278). Spiritual beings cannot be objects of inner sense either, since inner sense only acquaints us with our own inner mental states.  Thus Kant concludes:   “We can say no more here [about spiritual beings]; otherwise we degenerate into phantoms of the brain” (ibid).

However, all this seems equally true about the existence of other finite minds. Other finite minds can never be the objects of outer sense. As Kant writes:

A thinking being, as such, cannot at all be an object of outer sense: we can perceive through outer sense neither thinking nor willing nor the faculty of pleasure and displeasure; and we cannot imagine how the soul as a thinking being should be an object of outer sense (28:271).

And as we noted before, we can never know about other minds through our inner sense either. Given these conclusions, Kant asks:  “Are we to cognize souls that are outside of us… for which we have no data at all?” (28:275). His answer here seems wholly negative. Since other finite minds cannot be an object either of inner or outer sense, we should regard their existence as equally problematic as the existence of spiritual beings.

3. The Empirical Approach: Other Minds in the 2nd Paralogism

In the 2nd Paralogism of the 1st Critique, Kant returns to the question of other minds.  Similar to the Lectures on Metaphysics, Kant argues that other minds can never be an object of outer sense. As he writes:

We can rightfully say that our thinking subject is not corporeal, meaning that since it is represented as an object of our inner sense, insofar as it thinks, it could not be an object of outer sense, i.e., it could not be an appearance in space. Now this is to say as much that thinking beings, as such, can never come before us among outer appearances, or: we cannot intuit their thoughts, their consciousness, their desires, etc. externally; for this belongs before inner sense (A358).

Kant recognizes that we cannot perceive the inner mental states of others. However, he interestingly suggests that we can infer from their bodies that they have inner mental lives. As he writes:

…thus I can also assume that in the substance itself, to which extension pertains in respect of our outer sense, thought may also be present, which may be represented with consciousness through their own inner sense.  In such a way the very same thing that is called body in one relation would at the same time be a thinking being in another, whose thoughts, of course, we could not intuit, but only their signs in appearance. Thereby the expression that only souls…think would be dropped; and instead it would be said, as usual, that human beings think, i.e., that the same being that as outer appearance is extended is inwardly (in itself) a subject, which is not composite, but is simple and thinks (A359-360, emphasis added).

In this passage, Kant claims that we can view other human beings in two different ways: first, with regard to outer appearance, in terms of their physical bodies, and second, with regard to inner appearance, in terms of their nature as thinking subjects. Given this, Kant suggests that the correlation between our minds and bodies gives us sufficient grounds for inferring an inner mental life from how others behave. In this way, Kant anticipates John Stuart Mill’s famous “argument from analogy.” According to Mill, we can be justified believing in other minds based on a posteriori inductive grounds. As Mill explains:

By what evidence do I know, or by what considerations am I led to believe, that there exists other sentient creatures; that the walking and speaking figures which I see and hear, have sensations and thoughts, or in other words, possess Minds?. . . I conclude it from certain things, which my experience of my own states of feeling proves to me to be marks of it.

We can reconstruct Mill’s argument as follows:

P1. Based on my own case, I know that there is a correlation between my internal mental states and my external behavior.
P2. Other people display analogous behavior

C. Therefore, I infer, based on my own case, that there exists a similar correlation between their internal mental states and their external behavior, i.e., that they have minds similar to my own.

For example, I look at my friend Evan, notice that he looks angry, and form the belief that Evan is angry. According to Mill, this inference is grounded in the fact that when I’m angry, I behave in similar ways. From my own case, I infer by analogy that Evan is angry too.  Thus, Mill argues that we can justify our belief in the existence of other minds via inductive reasoning, generalizing from our own individual case to all others.

Kant’s argument is both resembles and differs from Mill’s. Mill argues that we can consider the ‘signs in appearance’ as evidence for the fact that other people are thinking beings because we are reasoning by analogy from our own case to theirs. By contrast, Kant makes a direct causal inference that other minds exist on the basis of the ‘signs in appearance’. Unlike Mill, he does so without appeal to analogy.  In the end, however, Kant and Mill both assume that external behavior is sufficient grounds for inferring inner mental states in others.

4. The Transcendental Approach: Keller’s Reading of the 3rd Paralogism

Do we find any transcendental arguments for the existence of other minds in Kant’s writings?  Pierre Keller interestingly suggests that we can find one in the 3rd Paralogism.  At A362-3 Kant writes, “But if I consider myself from the standpoint of another (as an object of his outer intuition), then it is this external observer who originally considers me as in time… the time in which the observer posits me is not the time that is encountered in my sensibility but that which is encountered in his own…” Based on Kant’s claims, Keller argues that an appeal to other minds is required for establishing objective knowledge of our identity over time. We can formulate Keller’s argument as follows:

P1. One’s identity over time can be grounded either in a 1st person or a 3rd person perspective (p. 175)
P2. It cannot be grounded in a 1st person perspective, because, from the 1st person perspective alone, I cannot distinguish between what seems to be the case from what actually is the case about my identity over time (p. 176)
P3. Therefore, we need a 3rd person perspective in order to determine one’s identity over time. (from P1, P2)
P4. The 3rd person perspective involves representing ourselves from the perspective of an external observer, i.e., from the perspective of another mind

C. Therefore, in order to establish our actual identity over time, we must be able to think of ourselves from the perspective of other minds. (from P3 and P4)

On Keller’s reconstruction, Kant is offering a kind of transcendental argument for the necessity of positing other minds. We assume that we are identical over time. In order for this to be possible, however, we cannot ground our identity over time by appealing to the 1st-person perspective alone. As Keller writes:

From the purely first-person perspective, there does not seem to be any way of drawing a distinction between one’s representation of one’s identity over time and one’s actual identity over time. In order to get a feel for this distinction, one must be able to shift from the first- to the second or to the third-person perspective. (1998: 176, emphasis added)

Akin to Wittgenstein’s private language argument, Keller suggests that other minds are necessary for distinguishing between what seems to be the case and what actually is the case. Interestingly, this seems to be the inverse of a view Kant defends in the 2nd Paralogism.  As he writes there:

It is obvious that if one wants to represent a thinking being, one must put oneself in its place, and thus substitute one’s own subject for object one wants to consider…; and it is also obvious that we demand absolute unity for the subject of thought only because otherwise it could not be said: ‘I think’ (the manifold of representation) (A354).

Kant argues that in order to be able to represent other minds, we need to think about them from our 1st person perspective. That is, we must represent another person’s mind by putting ourselves in their place. As Keller puts it, “One must already put oneself in the position of another in order to ascribe consciousness to some other person.” By contrast, on Keller’s reading of the 3rd Paralogism, Kant defends the opposite claim.  That is, in order to be able to represent ourselves as enduring over time, we need to think about ourselves from a 3rd person perspective, seeing ourselves as an ‘object’ represented by other minds.  If it was impossible for us to take up this hypothetical perspective of another mind, we would never be able to draw the distinction between it seeming to us to be case and it actually being the case with respect to our own identity over time.

5. Faith Approach: Other Minds as a Moral Belief

So far we have discussed three different approaches that Kant takes to the problem of other minds.  First, Kant provides a wholly negative answer to the problem in the Lectures on Metaphysics.  Second, Kant offers an empirical argument in the 2nd Paralogism. It was argued there that we can infer from the behavior of others that they have minds. Third, on Keller’s reading, Kant offers a transcendental argument for the existence of other minds in the 3rd Paralogism. On this view, other minds are necessary for determining our own identity in time. One final strategy can be found in Kant’s writings about moral faith.  In the “Canon of Pure Reason” of the 1st Critique, Kant defends the view that what he calls ‘belief’ or ‘faith’ (Glaube) does not require evidence in order for it to be rational. Because we cannot know other minds through inner or outer sense, Kant’s appeal to moral faith is important here. On this view, we don’t need to have evidence for other minds to be rationally justified in believing that they exist.

Kant speaks of ‘belief’ as one way of “assenting” or a way of holding something to be true. Kant describes assent as “an occurrence in our understanding that may rest on objective grounds, but that also requires subjective causes in the mind of him who judges [A656/B684].” That is, a person S who assents to some proposition P does so on the basis of some subjective or personal considerations and on some objective or evidential considerations. In this way, S takes her subjective and objective grounds to justify her assenting that P.

Now if S’s assent relies on these grounds, it follows naturally that judging whether S’s assent is rational or not depends on how good her objective and her subjective grounds are. Kant puts this in terms of “sufficiency.” Following Andrew Chignell, we can define “objectively sufficient” grounds as follows:

S has “objectively sufficient” grounds for assent that P = df. S would appeal to things such as arguments, experiences, or testimony that render the proposition she assents to highly probable in being true

For example, take my assent that “Boston is a city in Massachusetts.” I have objectively good grounds for this assent; I’ve been Boston and can testify that it falls within the borders of Massachusetts. What it means for someone to have “subjectively sufficient” grounds is a bit trickier. Chignell argues that there are two different senses in which a ground is “subjectively sufficient.” Intuitively, the first sense of subjective sufficiency is simply when a person takes themselves to have good evidence for their assent. We can formulate the first sense of ‘subjectively sufficient’ as follows:

S has “subjectively sufficient” grounds1=df. S has objectively sufficient grounds (or good evidence) for assenting that P and S would cite those grounds as the basis for that assent

The second sense of subjective sufficiency is when a person doesn’t have objectively sufficient evidence but does have certain practical grounds for her belief. We can formulate the second sense of subjective sufficiency as follows:

S has “subjectively sufficient” grounds2=df. S has subjectively sufficient grounds when S’s assent that P enables S to realize some interest, goal or end that S has

Therefore, S’s assent is rationally justified so long as she has “objectively sufficient” grounds and/or “subjectively sufficient” grounds. S’s assent is not rationally justified if her grounds are both “objectively insufficient” and “subjectively insufficient.”

All assents involve an objective and subjective component. However, these come in varying degrees of justification. As Kant famously argues, in the case of knowledge, we have both objectively sufficient and subjectively sufficient grounds for assent. In the case of opinion, we have both objectively insufficient and subjectively insufficient grounds for assent. Finally, in the case of belief or faith, we have objectively insufficient but subjectively sufficient grounds for assent. In keeping with this, Kant writes: “The word “belief”… concerns only the direction that an idea gives me… that holds me fast to it, even though I am not in a position to give an account of it from a speculative point of view [688].” Belief is assent to a proposition that gives us “direction”. However, beliefs don’t require us, as Kant puts it, to “give an account of it from a speculative point of view.” Instead they just require what Andrew Chignell helpfully calls a ‘non-epistemic merit’.  He defines non-epistemic merits as “a property of an assent that makes it valuable or desirable for a particular subject to have given her goals, interests, and needs.” In fact, for some beliefs, we could never be in a position to cite objectively sufficient evidence. Paradigmatic examples of this sort of belief include God, immortality of the soul, and freedom, that is, ‘the Practical Postulates’.

These are cases of what Kant calls ‘moral belief’. To count as moral belief, assent must satisfy two conditions.  Kant states both of these in his 1786 essay What Does it Mean to Orient Oneself in Thinking. The first is a negative claim which I will call the “No Evidence Condition” [NEC]. We can find this expressed in the following:

For if it has been previously made out that there can be no intuition of objects or anything of the kind… then there is nothing left for us to do except first to examine the concept with which we venture to go beyond all possible experience to see if it is free of contradiction, and then at least to bring the relation of the object to objects of experience under the pure concepts of the understanding – through which we do not render it sensible, but we do at least think of something supersensible in a way which is serviceable to the experiential use of our reason.  For without this caution we would be unable to make any use at all of such concepts; instead of thinking, we would indulge in enthusiasm (8:139).

There are two features here. First, faith or belief can never contradict the available objective evidence (8:144). For example, I can’t rationally believe that there is a flying spaghetti monster in this room. This contradicts what my senses – and hopefully everybody else’s senses – tell them about this room. Second, faith or belief must have no supporting evidence, i.e., it can never be transformed into a claim of knowledge (8:141). For example, belief in the existence of God or in the immortality of the soul can never be empirically proven. The second feature is a positive claim that I will call the “Need of Practical Reason Condition” [NRC]. As Kant writes:

Far more important is the need of reason in its practical use, because it is unconditioned, and we are necessitated to presuppose the existence of God not only if we want to judge, but because we have to judge. For the pure practical use of reason consists in the precepts of the moral laws. They all lead, however, to the idea of the highest good possible in the world insofar as its possible only through freedom…Now reason needs to assume, for the sake of such a dependent highest good, a supreme intelligence as the highest independent good…in order to give objective reality to the concept of the highest good, i.e., to prevent it, along with morality, from being taken as a mere ideal, as it would be if that whose idea inseparably accompanies morality should not exist anywhere (8:139).

On Kant’s view, rational agents are subject the unconditional commands of morality. In keeping with this, human beings have an unconditional obligation to pursue moral ends that are “absolutely necessary”. One thing which morality commands is that we pursue the highest good. That is, the highest good is a necessary object of morality.  As Kant writes:

[T]he promotion of the highest good, which contains this connection [between virtue and happiness] in its concept, is an a priori necessary object of our will and inseparably bound up with the moral law… (5:114)

In order to realize the highest good, we have to meet two conditions: first, complete moral perfection or “holiness of will” and second a state of happiness proportional to our moral character, that is, our “virtue”. If this highest good is a necessary object of moral willing, then we have to assume that it is possible. In the passage above, Kant argues that practical postulates like God and freedom are necessary conditions for the possibility of the highest good. First, we must presuppose that we have freedom to act as morality demands, that is, to autonomously fulfill our moral obligations. Second, we must presuppose that God exists in order to guarantee that happiness will be distributed in exact proportion to our virtue.  Because God and freedom are necessary conditions for the highest good, to deny either would necessarily make morality a “mere ideal”. For in this case, morality would demand something – namely, the highest good – that isn’t possible to realize. Since we are committed to morality, and since morality insists that the highest good is a necessary object of our moral willing, Kant concludes that we must have moral belief in these practical postulates.

Recall that beliefs can be justified if they have what Chignell calls non-epistemic merits, that is, they enable us to realize some interest, goal, or end that we have. This is what we called “subjectively sufficient grounds” in the second sense. We saw above that the belief in God and freedom have such subjectively sufficient grounds. Though we are never in a position to know that God exists or that we are free, we must believe both, since assent to these propositions is necessary for morality. Here we return to the question of whether the existence of other minds fits the bill for moral belief. Carol von Kirk argues that it does. She argues that we have to assume other minds exist because otherwise, we cannot make our interactions with other people fully intelligible. In particular, other people display moral behavior. As she writes:

When we consider people the only way of making sense of all of their actions is to assume that, in addition to being subject to the natural causal order, they are also subject to an order based upon self-awareness…  For Kant, rationality is not something that is inferred from “the data” because there are no data regarding the moral realm unless rationality is presupposed. Rationality must be assumed at the outset if a particular type of behavior is to be coherent (1980: 54)

So in order to have a coherent understanding of the behavior of others, we must conclude that other minds exist. For such reasons, Kirk argues that there is no problem of other minds for Kant. I want to make a stronger claim here. In contrast to Kirk, my claim is that other minds are necessary for morality in a way very similar to the Practical Postulates. Recall that Practical Postulates like freedom and God are necessary in order to realize the highest good.  The highest good is a necessary object of moral willing. Therefore, we must presuppose such practical postulates – which makes the highest good possible –if morality is not to be, as Kant puts it in the 2nd Critique, “fantastic and directed to empty imaginary ends and… therefore in itself false” (5:114).  In a parallel way, my claim is that other minds are equally necessary conditions for moral action. Morality imposes on us various duties and obligations towards others.  In order for it to be even possible for us to carry out such moral duties, other rational agents would obviously have to exist. So while Kirk argues that we must believe in other minds in order to make sense of other people’s moral behavior, I argue that other minds are necessary for the possibility of moral actions themselves.

6. Conclusion

What should we think about these four different approaches?  Do any of them succeed? In conclusion, I discuss the pros and cons of each view. First, in terms of the skeptical approach, I think that Kant is correct in insisting that other minds can never be an object of cognition for us, either for inner sense or outer sense.  What seems dissatisfying about this approach, however, is that instead of refuting skepticism, it essentially accepts the skeptical conclusion raised by the problem of other minds.

Second, in terms of the empirical approach, I think that Kant’s brief remarks in the 2nd paralogism are significant insofar as they anticipate Mill’s celebrated argument from analogy by appealing to ‘signs appearance’. The problem with Mill’s approach is that it seems doxastically irresponsible.  It generalizes from one individual case, namely, my own, to all other persons.  By contrast, the problem with Kant’s approach is that he seems to simply take it for granted that we can directly causally infer that other minds are the causes of signs in appearence. However, this is far from a satisfactory reply for somebody who doubts the existence of other minds in the first place.

Third, in terms of the transcendental approach, what seems good about it is that, if successful, it is arguably the strongest of all four views discussed here. It makes the existence of other minds necessary for the possibility of self-knowledge, in particular, for knowledge of ourselves as identical over time. In this way, objective self-knowledge entails belief in other minds. This argument, however, faces a serious problem. In the end, it doesn’t seem to prove that other minds actually exist. All that it establishes is that we have adopt a hypothetical 3rd person perspective in order to regard ourselves as enduring over time, regardless of whether anybody occupies this perspective or not.

Fourth and lastly, in terms of the faith approach, what seems good about this strategy is that it is more modest than the others views because it doesn’t claim that we can theoretically know that other minds exist. If successful, it establishes that we are at least rationally justified in believing that other minds exist. However, this argument has its problems too. First, it assumes that we accept the existence of morality and in particular, that we have genuine moral duties to others. Consequently, if a skeptic were to deny morality, this argument would fail to address their worries. Second, the argument is too weak. We are not content with having mere faith about the existence of the external world.  So why should we be content with mere faith about the existence of external minds?  In the end, I think that Kant fails to adequately resolve skeptical worries about the existence of other finite minds.  At best, Kant can establish that their existence is a tenet of moral faith, and never something we can truly know.

Eternal Knowledge and Belief in Spinoza

In his Ethics, Spinoza writes that “He, who has a true idea, simultaneously knows that he has a true idea, and cannot doubt of the truth of the thing perceived.”[1]  The notion in this passage, which is referenced in multiple other passages in the Ethics, is that knowledge is an a priori function derived from that which is eternal.  Spinoza thus considers knowledge of God as the only adequate idea, so that what is known is only that which is completely certain.[2]  As eternal knowledge is completely certain, Spinoza seems to avoid the Cartesian skepticism that rules over the perceptions.  Spinoza relies on his previously explained metaphysic in which all substance is one, that is, that all substance is God, and thus indivisible and infinite.  However, such a notion seems to fly in the face of many variations of the classical foundationalist model of justified true belief epistemologies.  The knowledge is already there, much like a Platonic doctrine of ideas, but is unique to Spinoza because of his doctrine of infinite substance.  Thus, one does not need to prove that truth is had, which differs from the Cartesian method that seeks to correct false ideas to arrive at knowledge.[3]  Furthermore, belief is unnecessary to knowledge because belief is not necessarily of the truth.  Justification of this truth is unnecessary as well due to knowledge being of that which is already known.  Thus, there seems an issue at work here, pointed out by Richard Mason in his article “Spinoza and the Unimportance of Belief,” that Spinoza “gave no clue about how the gap between belief and knowledge might be bridged, beyond a suggestion that immediate intuition seemed enough to sift true from false ideas.”[4]  The answer to this issue seems largely unanswered.  However, while Mason’s claim seems accurate in that Spinoza does not directly address the supposed separation of knowledge and belief, the answer lies implicitly in the Ethics, and is seen upon a closer examination of what Spinoza means by his doctrine of eternal knowledge.  I will argue that Spinoza’s system does indeed account for Mason’s discrepancy between knowledge and belief; it will be seen that knowledge, according to Spinoza’s account, is not entirely separate from belief, but in a particular way entails belief.

First, I must briefly clarify Spinoza’s system.  It is derived from a notably pantheistic metaphysic in which “There can only be one substance with an identical attribute…It does not exist as finite, for it would then be limited by something else of the same kind, which would also necessarily exist…It therefore exists as infinite.”[5]  Such an infinite substance, according to Spinoza, can only be God.[6]  Because there is only one infinite substance, that is, God, “Substance absolutely infinite is indivisible.”[7]  It is from this notion that Spinoza is able to arrive at a concept of an eternal mind.  He writes that “The idea of God, from which an infinite number of things follow in infinite ways, can only be one.”[8]  Furthermore, “Infinite intellect comprehends nothing save the attributes of God and his modifications,” and since there is only one substance, there is only one idea that can be comprehended, specifically God as infinite substance.[9]  Spinoza takes this idea of one infinite substance and intellect and carries it further to show that this notion leads to the deduction that there can only be one mind, so that the seeming individuality of particular minds are actually just infinite attributes of the one substance.[10]  Thus, “Our mind (the one mind or substance, that is, God), in so far as it knows itself and the body under the form of eternity, has to that extent necessarily a knowledge of God, and knows that it is in God, and is conceived through God.”[11]  This eternal mind, as recognized by Spinoza, is a natural extension of the one substance, but its main usefulness here is that it explains Spinoza’s position on eternal knowledge, that is, that knowledge is a priori and is of the infinite substance.  Another way of stating this concept is that “Knowledge is of essence…the reflection of the ideal of Being.”[12]  The Cartesian assumption that multiple minds, or a minimal distinction between God and individual self, exist separately is entirely true according to Spinoza’s framework.[13]  Rather, the apparent distinction between the finite substance and infinite substance is actually just a matter of the “points of view of the whole.”[14]  The one substance is thus in an infinite state of comprehending itself, and it does so by an infinite chain of attributes that simply appear as finite within the human mind.

One issue with the notion of eternal knowledge arises when Spinoza seems to believe that the finite mind continues to acquire knowledge after death.[15]  This might seem unreasonable given Spinoza’s metaphysics of infinite substance.  For example, Michael Lebuffe asks the question, “How can Spinoza hold that what is eternal is also a thing that can change over the course of one’s life?”[16]  However, it is precisely this metaphysics that accounts for such a claim.  First, Spinoza’s pantheistic account of substance renders death to the same level that it renders individuality—it seems to merely be a matter of point of view.  That is, death of the individual requires the particular individual.  What is thought to be the particular individual is actually just a modification of Spinoza’s one substance.  Thus, death seems to merely be an alteration of the state of the substance.  Yet this account of death does not entirely answer the issue of change seeming to occur in infinite substance.  The answer is found in Spinoza’s claim that while the eternal mind of the infinite substance does not actually change by increasing or decreasing in knowledge, the finite parts, or individual minds, operate according to “proportions” in order to comprehend the one substance.[17]  Lebuffe explains that “When other parts of a mind decrease, the eternal part of a mind can increase, as a proportion of a mind, without itself changing.”[18]  Thus Spinoza introduces a certain amount of realization into his method.  As noted, the finite parts of the one substance are only finite insofar as they merely seem to be particulars, acting as particulars on a practical level.  Each mind is actually just a mode of the eternal mind.  By introducing proportions, to increase the part of the mind that is eternal is to increase in realization of the eternal mind.  Death is one way that this process is furthered, and so it can be seen that change does not actually occur, but rather infinite and finite knowledge remains immutable.

I suggest that by recognizing that there is a certain degree of realization involved in the reconciliation of supposed differences between finite and infinite minds, Spinoza’s system no longer seems to be antagonistic toward classical foundationalist notions, but is rather seeking to fulfill the demands of a suitable epistemology.  Jon Miller writes that Spinoza’s a priori system of knowledge is not an effort to undermine foundationalism, but has the goal of correcting probabilistic systems such Descartes’ system, as “Any philosophical system, then, if it is to be satisfactory, must begin with what is epistemically basic.”[19]  By outlining an a priori metaphysic, Spinoza seeks to make truth and justification the same; it is on this a priori knowledge that all other knowledge is based on.  Thus it provides the foundation upon which other knowledge can be justified.

In response to the apparent separation between knowledge and belief, it is important to understand that from Spinoza’s system can be inferred an implicit distinction between belief alone and knowledge that entails belief, which I claimed earlier that Spinoza supports implicitly within his metaphysic.  As demonstrated, Spinoza’s a priori system sets up a series of basic truths that are known.  From these truths are derived that God, substance, and mind are one and infinite.  To reconcile supposed changes in finite minds, it is recognized that the finite minds are actually just part of the infinite whole and are in the infinite process of realization.  This is why Spinoza writes that “The mind’s highest good is the knowledge of God.”[20]  He implicitly means that even after death the mind is still infinitely realizing God as infinite substance.  Thus belief is contained within knowledge.  Belief is not completely absent, as Mason might suggest, but is part of the realization process of the eternal mind.  Knowledge of God, as Spinoza demonstrates, is definite so that it is absolutely known.  It is unimportant for Spinoza to make belief a separate condition for knowledge since it is already entailed by this system.  Furthermore, belief as a condition in itself leads to probabilistic doubt, a flaw that Spinoza recognized in Descartes’ system.  By forming an a priori system of absolutely certain basic truths, “Spinoza is concerned to minimize the harmful effects of beliefs that cause strife and disorder,” therefore avoiding the pitfalls of Descartes’ methodical doubt.[21]  Descartes recognized that knowledge of God was all-important, although Spinoza sought to correct some errors in his methodology.[22]  The invocation of infinite substance as God and eternal mind allowed Spinoza to avoid issues with uncertainty present in Descartes, as well as form a certain and basic foundation on which one can have knowledge.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Benedict de Spinoza. Works of Spinoza: The Ethics, translated by R. H. M. Elwes. New York: Dover Publications, Inc., 1955.

Edmund Gettier.  1963. Is Justified True Belief Knowledge? Analysis 23, no. 6, (June 1): 121-123.

Jon Miller. 2004. “Spinoza and the A Priori.” Canadian Journal of Philosophy 34, no. 4: 555-590.

Leon Roth. Spinoza, Descartes, and Maimonides. New York: Russell and Russell, 1963.

Michael Lebuffe. 2005. “Spinoza’s Summum Bonum.” Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 86: 243-266.

__________. 2010. “Change and the Eternal Part of the Mind in Spinoza.” Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 91: 369-384.

Moira Gatens. 2012. “Compelling Fictions: Spinoza and George Elliot on Imagination and Belief.” European Journal of Philosophy 20, no.1: 74-90.

René Descartes. Meditations on First Philosophy, translated by Donald A. Cress. Indianapolis, Indiana: Hackett Publishing Company, 1993.

Richard Mason. 2004. “Spinoza and the Unimportance of Belief.” Philosophy 79: 281-298.

 

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[1]Spinoza, Benedict de, Works of Spinoza: The Ethics, trans. R. H. M. Elwes (New York: Dover Publications, Inc., 1955), 114.

[2] Ibid.

[3] Mason, Richard, “Spinoza and the Unimportance of Belief,” Philosophy 79 (2004): 284.

[4] Ibid, 282.

[5] Spinoza, Ethics, 48.

[6] Ibid, 45.

[7] Ibid, 54.

[8] Ibid, 85.

[9] Ibid.

[10] Ibid, 96.

[11] Ibid, 262.

[12] Roth, Leon, Spinoza, Descartes, and Maimonides (New York: Russell and Russell, 1963), 110.

[13] Descartes, René, Meditations on First Philosophy, trans. Donald A. Cress (Indianapolis, Indiana: Hackett Publishing Company, 1993), 46.

[14] Roth, Spinoza, Descartes, and Maimonides, 110.

[15] Spinoza, Ethics, 267.

Lebuffe, Michael, “Change and the Eternal Part of the Mind in Spinoza,” Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 91 (2010): 369.

[16] Ibid.

[17] Spinoza, Ethics, 266.

[18] Lebuffe, Change and the Eternal Part of the Mind in Spinoza, 370.

[19] Miller, Jon, “Spinoza and the A Priori,” Canadian Journal of Philosophy 34, no. 4 (2004): 565.

[20] Spinoza, Ethics, 205.

Lebuffe, Michael, “Spinoza’s Summum Bonum,” Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 86, (2005): 251.

[21] Gatens, Moira, “Compelling Fictions: Spinoza and George Eliot on Imagination and Belief,” European Journal of Philosophy 20, no. 1 (2012): 76.

Descartes, Meditations, 17.

[22] Ibid, 25.

Clarifying ‘Continental’ and ‘Analytic’

Is there or is there not a distinction between what is called analytical and what is called continental philosophy? We’ve talked about this some, but the answers are so far, unsatisfying.

It is necessary to remove one objection to this inquiry before I begin. That is, that there is no continental/analytic distinction, or there isn’t one anymore. I’ll make a brief, imprecise argument against this here.

1. When I’m talking to members of this symposium about the distinction, we seem to be referring to something similar and understood amongst ourselves.
2. It is useful clarify what one means in a group of one’s peers.
3. It is useful to us to discuss the distinction.
4. A false distinction would be a waste of time to talk about.
5. Therefore it is describing a real distinction.

However, that doesn’t mean that we are using the words ‘continental’ and ‘analytic’ well, so the conclusion of this clarificatory process could be that we should use different words. But with that out of the way, let’s begin. I’ll explain two senses which seem insufficient, and then provide a potential solution.

(1) The usual sense in which we seem to delineate the two is something along the following lines: Analytic thought is depth-oriented, whereas continental thought is breadth-oriented. This isn’t wrong, exactly, but it is unclear what is being said. Obviously a good analytic philosopher wants to incorporate his conclusions into some kind of broad philosophical system, and continental philosopher wants to know how specific points cooperate in his outlook. Additionally, the farther we move from the positivists and British or Hegelian idealists, the more this seems to break down. Yes, an analytic work can be overly concerned with absolute precision (e.g., maybe Gettier discussions in epistemology), but a contemporary continental work can be equally narrow on the issues with which it is concerned. Both have come to assume a prior, accepted framework in which their work is done.

(2)Another way we’ve described it discussion is that the difference is one of method. Philosophical investigation seems to have very tight rules for the analytic. Defining one’s terms clearly, for example, is absolutely necessary. Possibility, necessity, right, good, justification, and so on, all have specific meanings and must be used accurately for meaningful discourse to proceed. The continental, on the other hand, can seem flippant with words she uses. For example, Derrida: “Deconstruction, by definition, cannot be defined.” Obviously, this is some kind of a joke, or a word game, the analytic might say. However, at times the continental will speak paradoxically and meant to be taken very seriously. The analytic cannot abide this. So, the method seems to be different.

This is more accurate than (1), as I hope to explain in my concluding paragraph. However, there are at least three problems with this explanation. First, the “tight rules” of the analytic have not been well-defined, and there doesn’t seem much reason to try. Vague guidelines can be made (clarity, precision, involvedness, comprehensiveness) but this isn’t a real definition of the essence of analytic philosophy. It is more of a description of its accoutrements. Second, because the continental is essentially defined negatively, (as not-a-follower-of-the-analytic-rules) it is equally vague.

(3) Though (2) is not sufficient to explain the distinction, it does point us in the right direction. There is a sense in which we are talking about a method of philosophizing. However, philosophizing is not the same as composing philosophy, which seems to be where (2) goes wrong. Those guidelines of analytic philosophy seem to exist because they describe loosely the way analytic philosophy is composed. However, the way analytic philosophy is written is expressive of something more fundamental in analytic thought. (1), however also helps in constructing this analysis, because the difference in philosophical method seems to be a difference in the order of operations of the “schools”. My proposition, then, is this:

1. What we have meant by an analytic philosopher (as philosopher) is one who attempts to work from the objectively meaningful to the subjectively meaningful. Definitions are proposed, [objective] propositions accepted or rejected, and then connected together to form a “book” of propositions about what one believes about the world. Questions are first directed against individual propositions, and then (if at all) the systems of those propositions in general.

2. What we have meant by a continental philosopher (as philosopher) is one who attempts to work from the subjectively meaningful to the objectively meaningful. A structure (one could even say narrative structure) is proposed – Marxism, Hegelianism, deconstructionism, etc. This becomes then the subjective method by which one applies and appropriates propositions about the world. Questions are first directed against individual propositions, and then (if at all) the systems of those propositions in general.

Let’s take two small, quick examples:

1. “Judging whether life is or is not worth living amount to answering the fundamental question of philosophy.” –Albert Camus
2. “I will stay on this course until I know something certain, or, if nothing else, until I at least know for certain that nothing is certain… [G]reat things are to be hoped for if I succeed in finding one thing, however slight, that is certain and unshaken.” — Rene Descartes

I use Camus and Descartes because neither is really continental or analytic, historically speaking. Camus is concerned with valuation, Descartes with certainty. Descartes is the most obvious possible example: Mathematical logic (something objective), essentially, will dictate and put together a system of philosophy for oneself (subjective). His cogito ergo sum is metaphysical, and thus a justifiable starting point for philosophy.

Camus’s project is similar in some ways—he too is looking for a kind of certainty. However, this certainty is not whether something exists, exactly, but rather one is able to live, whether there is a way to orient oneself toward the world that will result in meaningful interaction. Indeed, for Camus, humanity must rebel against the cruel, empty “objective” world. (Dostoevsky’s classic and similar sentiment is noted below as a further example.)

1 and 2 above, I think, are  what we have generally meant by the analytic/continental distinction. Whether or not we should retain those words to describe the distinction (or philosophers themselves) is a different matter altogether.

I wrote this rather quickly, and I’m a little ashamed of it, but I wanted to get it posted or I’d never do it. There are still some issues with my final solution, I think, and I’d like to hear your thoughts about it if you have the time. Let me know, at least if (A) this seems clear in general, and (B) if my proposed definition seems superior or inferior to the preceding definitions.

(“… I have shaped for myself a Credo where everything is clear and sacred for me. This Credo is very simple, here it is: to believe that nothing is more beautiful, profound, sympathetic, reasonable, manly, and more perfect than Christ; and I tell myself with a jealous love not only that there is nothing but that there cannot be anything. Even more, if someone proved to me that Christ is outside the truth, and that in reality the truth were outside of Christ, then I should prefer to remain with Christ rather than with truth.” –Fyodor Dostoevsky)